


Not to Sound Like a Broken Record

by fancywaffles



Series: Off the Record [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Fódlan Setting (Fire Emblem), Alternate Universe - Rock Band, Canonical Character Death, Childhood Friends, Epic Friendship, F/M, Getting Back Together, Getting Together, Grief/Mourning, Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Minor Ingrid Brandl Galatea/Glenn Fraldarius, Mutual Pining, Only One Bed, Recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-27
Updated: 2020-09-27
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:08:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 35,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26671909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fancywaffles/pseuds/fancywaffles
Summary: Five years after Dimitri, Felix, Ingrid, and Sylvain's band (the Blue Lions) broke up and they all moved away from each other, the Battle of the Bands (at Gronder Field) presents Sylvain with a perfect plan to get the band back together.It does not go well.(or, it's a band au with dimilx & sylvgrid & fixing friendships)
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd & Felix Hugo Fraldarius & Ingrid Brandl Galatea & Sylvain Jose Gautier, Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Felix Hugo Fraldarius, Ingrid Brandl Galatea/Sylvain Jose Gautier, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Series: Off the Record [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1941622
Comments: 38
Kudos: 73





	Not to Sound Like a Broken Record

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ningicoco](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ningicoco/gifts).



> This fic is dedicated to ningicoco, who when I _begged_ to talk me out of this idea--helped me come up with all the band names and half the playlist instead.
> 
> I'm still mad at you.
> 
> This comes with a [Spotify Playlist - Off the Record](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5182Xr1MxpMnzWJYJgyrn5?si=MMxE6fOyQpCoExG93DSesQ), it has 69 songs, because Sylvain. Feel free to put it on shuffle, but there are songs that correlate to ones referenced here and bands that have band vibes for the fic. 
> 
> P.S. Turn the workskin for fancy iOS messages. And check the tags for content warnings.

“Oh!” Flayn said, pointing towards her left. “That is Dimitri Blaiddyd from The Silver Maiden!”

Ignatz swung the stick holding the Crest Phone towards the direction Flayn pointed. He tried to get her in the shot too as they approached the very tall and blond lead for one of the front runners in Seiros Records’ Battle of the Bands. Ignatz adjusted the focus and a few of the settings to make sure they had a good frame for Dimitri’s interview as Flayn introduced them and gave the rundown of the vlogumentary they were making.

For someone who had seemed intimidating on approach, Dimitri was well-mannered and answered Flayn’s questions easily and with a friendly smile. “There are only three men in your band, so why have the name The Silver Maiden?” Flayn asked, blushing.

Dimitri’s smile twisted into something more wry. “Ah, well Sylvain suggested it. He thought perhaps it would chance us with an attractive female member.”

Flayn hesitated for a moment and Ignatz made a mental note of having to cut that out, which was a shame, the lighting was perfect in the shot. Then she held the mic up a little higher. “Sylvain was in a band with you before, was he not? About five years ago?”

Dimitri cleared his throat and though his smile stayed in place, it seemed more polite than anything else. “Yes, we had a group with two of our friends. Ingrid and—” Dimitri startled and looked across the hall before finishing his sentence with, “Felix?”

Ignatz moved quickly to steady the shot on where he was looking, and sure enough Felix Fraldarius—the backbone of another front runner, the Swamp Beasties—was standing there. His eyes were opened wide and Ignatz had enough time to pan back between the both of them before Felix scoffed and then turned around, striding forcefully in the other direction.

Ignatz was about to turn the shot back to Dimitri—a sad (but well framed) frown as he looked in Felix’s direction—but then Sylvain Gautier, bassist of The Silver Maiden yelped and said, “What the hell Ingrid?”

Next to him, the drummer of Valiant Knights, Ingrid Galatea, was holding her fist aloft. “You said he knew!”

“He knew!” Sylvain said and then shrugged helplessly. “I mean he knew I was playing in my band that I’d formed recently and would also be here. Not… who the rest of the band were?”

“You’re unbelievable, Sylvain,” Ingrid snapped and then turned around, ignoring Sylvain calling after her.

Ignatz moved as far back as possible and set the shot up so he could catch the expressions on both Sylvain and Dimitri's faces. They were nearly identically forlorn.

This was good stuff. They would definitely hit a million subscribers if they kept this up.

♫ ♫ ♫

#### Two Weeks Earlier

♫ ♫ ♫

“Please!” Annette said.

Felix ignored her and went back to tuning his guitar.

“Felix!” Annette said again, louder.

Felix continued to ignore her, although it was kind of hard to keep from laughing as Annette climbed over the couch to get height and then leaned over his head. “Felix, it could be really good exposure! The prize is a record deal and promotion for an entire year!”

“It seems… hokey,” Felix said, enjoying the way Annette slid off him and onto the couch, mostly to pout. “What if we don’t win?”

“We will totally win,” Annette said with far too much confidence. “Your songs are so good. Marianne is a beast on the drums, and me and Mercie can sing like angels.”

She ended the last part with a little twirl of her hand and Felix snorted. “Besides,” Annette added, “It’ll be good exposure either way.”

“How? Gronder Field is big, but it’s still only a venue.”

“They’re live streaming it you luddite,” Annette said with a huff. “And the social media buzz is wild right now. We could get so many new followers!”

Felix thought about it, pausing in his tuning and leaning against his Zoltan guitar. He preferred the smaller venues. Even in his early years, he’d never really enjoyed eyes on him. He just… liked the music, but Annette was too talented to be obscure and they’d really made something with the band. “It’s a competition?” Felix asked.

Annette nodded. “Its dueling banjos!” she said, her voice rising in excitement. “It’s the War of the Elite Musicians! It’s Battle of the Bands!”

Felix sighed, drawing it out long enough that Annette got that little frustrated pout and then shrugged. “Okay. If Mari and Mercie are in, I’m good with it.”

“Yes!” Annette’s pout turned into a beaming smile as she pumped her fist in the air. Then she opened her eyes a little too wide at him and said, “Soooooo we have a set list, but a new song would really put us over the edge. Especially as a little treat for our fans.”

“We could bring back Library Boom?” Felix suggested, snorting as Annette squeaked in indignation.

“Felix! You’re evil!”

“I liked that song,” Felix said. He did. It was one of the first times he’d heard Annette sing. The absurdity of her singing in the campus library in the first place drew him towards her, but those lyrics especially were impossible not to cling to. He still wanted to know how it would end, but after Annette found out he wrote songs, she’d refused to finish. If he hadn’t heard her singing, he probably never would’ve gotten back into music in the first place.

“Agh!” Annette threw herself off the couch. “Mercie! Felix is being a pain!”

“That’s not really news, Annie,” Mercedes called out and Felix fought a smile. He heard Annette stomping off towards her and went back to tuning his guitar.

“What about Chivalry is Dead?” asked Marianne. If he hadn’t been used to her sneaking up like that, her sudden appearance would have startled him out of his skin.

As it was, all it did was make Felix’s stomach drop to his shoes, and make him set aside his guitar. “That’s… I don’t really think it’s the right vibe.”

Marianne smiled softly at him. “I think it’s really beautiful, Felix. You’ve only played it once.”

He’d been… not exactly drunk at the time. Mostly he’d been depressed. He’d been depressed and angry when he’d written it and it still twisted his guts to think about. Felix hadn’t been able to delete it, though and kept coming back to tweak certain bars and transitions when he was feeling listless. “I’ll write something new,” Felix said.

Marianne had the kind of soft resignation, with a tinge of kindness, that made her disappointment sting even more and made it impossible for Felix to get mad about. “I’ll think about it,” he added.

She smiled at him and then her eyebrows raised as somewhere in the back of their cramped apartment a loud noise, indicative of Annette falling on Marianne’s drum set clanged. Marianne rose to her feet quickly and shuffled towards it.

Felix picked up his guitar again. He strummed a couple of the chords leading into Chivalry is Dead and then something caught in his throat. Before he had time to examine it, his phone dinged.

**the song IS about me** the song IS about me  
  
**Sylvain:** guess who’s in your town and still upset you replaced them with another redhead?  **Sylvain:** i’ll give u a hint **Sylvain:** it rhymes with dexiest dan i dough  
  


Felix rolled his eyes, forgetting all about the song and texted Sylvain back.

♪

“Is it hard living with three extremely attractive ladies?” Sylvain asked, enjoying the familiarity of his (long distance) best friend’s eye roll.

“It’s hard sharing a bathroom.”

Sylvain gaped. “Did you turn into a stereotypical gay man with too many toiletries without telling me?”

The annoyed stare was also familiar, as was Felix ignoring his perfect quips. “The apartment’s better than the tour bus.”

Sylvain was dying to go on tour, but managing schedules and getting pickups for The Silver Maiden wasn’t easy. Not to mention how much time and energy Sylvain spent this year getting Dimitri to agree to be lead again in the first place. Not that Dedue wasn’t attractive (been there, rejected for that), but no one really had the star quality that Dimitri did. Stunning good looks, great manners, and a smooth voice that wasn’t loud enough to overshadow the music.

“Are you gonna stay on the tour bus for the competition?” Sylvain asked. He’d been surprised (and delighted, considering his masterplan) that Felix was doing it.

Felix shrugged. “Probably not. The bus is expensive to rent. Mercedes’ll take care of the details, but she’ll probably book a hotel.”

Sylvain sighed. He tried not too hard to think of the last time he talked to Mercedes and how badly Felix had threatened him if he hit on one of his bandmates. It wasn’t Sylvain’s fault Felix had a band full of hot girls. Meanwhile Sylvain was stuck with…

“You’re not doing one room, right?” Sylvain asked. “Hookups are a plenty at these kinds of things. There’s roadies, other bands, the groupie crowd if you’re into that.”

“You have groupies now?” Felix asked, unimpressed.

“We will after the competition,” Sylvain said, grinning. “Turns out they were looking for fresh faces and we scored a slot.”

“Congrats,” Felix said, actually impressed. “That’s big for how new you guys are. Who were your bandmates again?”

“Dedue is great,” Sylvain said, riffing off that starting point and spiraling into a story about Dedue’s constant need to garden and how Sylvain’s apartment had become filled with plants that he felt compelled to keep alive. He left out all the parts of Dimitri breaking pots, killing the plants, and then apologizing for hours about it.

“So uh, you heard from Ingrid lately?” Sylvain asked, avoiding the topic of who his other bandmate was (he’d been calling him His Highness in their sporadic text exchanges).

“Why?” Felix asked, suddenly suspicious.

Sylvain shrugged. “Just curious. She’s been spotty about following up when I call her.”

“Maybe because you keep calling her drunk,” Felix said.

Sylvain clapped his hands and pointed at Felix. “So you _have_ heard from her?”

Felix didn’t laugh and he didn’t roll his eyes. He sorta stared at the table and then scratched his nose. “Yeah, we… it was the five year anniversary last month. Ingrid came into town since she knew I wouldn’t be home for it.”

“I’m sorry, Fe,” Sylvain said, for lack of anything better to say. He’d hung back while Rodrigue and Dimitri paid their respects at the anniversary visit. It was hard not seeing Felix there. Time didn’t actually heal all wounds, but at least Dimitri seemed more at peace with things.

“It’s okay,” Felix said. “It was kind of nice actually. Better than haunting his graveyard.” The bitterness that swept through his voice was still acidic, but it left quickly. “Ingrid and I got drunk on Morfis Melon instead and vomited green.”

“Glenn would’ve hated that,” Sylvain said with a laugh and Felix laughed too.

Sylvain could not help smiling as he pictured it. From his most recent Indechgram stalking, Ingrid had cut her hair, so she probably didn’t need anyone holding it back. He still couldn’t help adding himself in that mental image, holding it back himself. Impossible to be a supportive friend at the same time for multiple friends on either side of Fódlan. Sylvain had been doing his best at it and playing interference for the last five years—and he was tired of it.

Thus the masterplan.

“Anyway,” Sylvain said, with an easy grin. “Mind texting Ingrid for me? I sent her some info on the Battle, but I think maybe she sends them to her junk filter now.”

“Can you blame her?” Felix asked.

“It was _one time_ ,” Sylvain said. “I thought it was funny!”

To be fair, maybe photoshopping Ingrid’s face onto the ad for stick removal had been a little over the top, but when Sylvain went into something he liked to commit.

“Anyway, please?” Sylvain asked. “As your oldest redheaded friend? Who still has not forgiven you for moving across the country to go to school and replace him with another redhead?”

“Stop changing your name to that in my phone,” Felix said, but then scoffed in annoyance and added, “Fine.”

♪

Ingrid handed her half-eaten steak sandwich to Raphael, knowing it’d be the last she’d see of it and practically flew at the two familiar faces in front of her. Sylvain laughed and squeezed her in response and Dimitri _smiled_ wide and hugged back.

If Felix were here already, it’d be perfect. She’d have her old boys back in wrangling distance. “I can’t believe we’re all here!” she said, feeling so happy to see Dimitri smiling. She glanced behind him, spying their third band member (who did not look as much like a carved statue of sandstone as Sylvain had graphically described him upon their first meeting). “You must be Dedue,” Ingrid said.

He nodded. “Dimitri and Sylvain have spoken much of you.”

“At least 70% of what Sylvain says isn’t true,” Ingrid said, ignoring Sylvain’s familiar objection in her ear.

Dedue smiled and nodded. “Yes, I have learned that.”

“Okay that’s it,” Sylvain said. “I’m going to go seduce your bandmates. This is unreasonable to gang up on me.”

“You’re welcome to try,” Ingrid said, gesturing behind her. She wasn’t actually sure which way Raphael swung, but she suspected it wasn’t in anyone like Sylvain’s direction and there was no way he was getting in between Ashe and Caspar unless he turned into their unofficial fifth, bandmate Linhardt.

“You will regret that,” Sylvain said. He leaned over to sweetly kiss her cheek, and then sped off in his latest pursuit of lechery. She ignored the urge to scrub her hand on her cheek and also tried to ignore the blush.

“You look really good,” Ingrid said, focusing on Dimitri.

Dimitri laughed softly. “Yes, that always seems to have a different connotation when people say it to me these days.”

“Hey,” Ingrid said, putting a hand to his arm. “You know what I mean.”

Dimitri nodded. He glanced behind her and judging by his expression, Sylvain was up to no good. She resisted the urge to check herself. Ingrid tried to strong-arm them into dinner for a proper catch-up, but it turned out they were staying at the same hotel. Sylvain, after failing spectacularly at his goal, demanded they have a mini band reunion in his hotel room.

“Dedue and Dimitri are sharing,” Sylvain said. “I offered to pay for another room, but,” he shrugged.

It wasn’t as if Dimitri couldn’t pay for the room himself, but Ingrid didn’t say that. They’d all gone to the same fairly prestigious academy, but sometimes it was clear who went on scholarship (Ingrid) and who didn’t (everyone else).

“Its a waste of money,” Dimitri said. “We won’t be in the rooms very often once the competition starts.”

Sylvain grumbled at that and went out to get drinks (Ingrid was absolutely not going to join him—she was still sick on green whenever she thought about alcohol). She couldn’t help stare at Dimitri. She knew he was doing better, but seeing it in person was wonderful. He looked so steady.

Dimitri caught her staring and smiled, knowingly. “Will I have such low standards for your approval once the novelty wears off?”

“It’s just really nice to see you.” Ingrid paused and then picked at a thread on her sleeve. “I’m sorry about missing the anniversary.”

“Flying out would’ve been excessive,” Dimitri said, placating her. It would’ve been expensive, but not excessive. Not for Glenn. Dimitri looked a little glazed over discussing that particular topic. That face would’ve worried her, but it didn’t last as long and his eyes and smile were warm when he looked back at her. “Sylvain claims he rejected you after you begged to join our band.”

“Oh, did he?” Ingrid asked, shaking her head.

“I would have enjoyed having you back,” Dimitri said, earnestly, but a little awkward. “But I understand why you declined.”

“Do you?” Ingrid asked.

Dimitri nodded and smiled even wider. “I have three copies of your LP. I don’t think we ever let you play that loudly when we rehearsed.”

Ingrid laughed and let out a weary, but fond sigh. “Loud, definitely is our sound.”

She was pretty sure she could hear Raphael and Caspar yell-speaking at each other from four rooms over. At some point she’d have to wrangle her current boys, but she wanted to spend a little more time with her old ones.

Hopefully five years was long enough for bygones to be bygones.

♪

Dimitri took his evening medication later than he should have, but in his defense, he hadn’t realized he would be staying up this late. He wasn’t sure if it was possible to feel light and heavy at the same time, but he had managed it. It was a joy to see Ingrid again, especially when Dimitri felt more himself than he had in years. Seeing her during his… darker turns had not been the same.

Still…

It was difficult to sit with Sylvain and Ingrid speaking of the ‘good times’ and ignore the fact that one of them was missing.

Dedue was not asleep, instead he was reading a book and pretending that he was not hovering and making sure Dimitri was dutifully performing his night routines. Dimitri went to his own bed and pulled out his phone.

He scrolled through his Indechgram feed. He rarely checked it and rarer than that used it (he only had one, because Sylvain had insisted it was good for their social media presence—and even then most of his pictures were of Dedue’s cooking or Rodrigue’s cat). He had followed everyone who had followed him—which had quickly overwhelmed his feed—so Dimitri had curated a list to only see his friends. It made it easy to scroll past Ingrid’s photos of her and her very exuberant large friend holding up four giant sized turkey legs and then land on the picture Sylvain posted almost two weeks ago.

Felix’s Indechgram was private. And as he had not followed Dimitri, Dimitri hadn’t requested to follow his—no matter how many times it came up suggested in his feed. (He also, with great effort, resisted adding annie-bananie, mercie_me, and the Swamp Beastie’s official Indechgram. Though he did as Sylvain called it, ‘stalk their feeds’ on occasion.)

The last picture on Sylvain’s Indechgram he’d looked at many times in the last two weeks. Sylvain had his arm slung across Felix’s shoulders, who had an incredibly irritated expression on his face, with the caption beneath: ‘taking my old alley cat out for dinner.’ Felix’s hair was different from when he last saw him, shorter—though Dimitri couldn’t pinpoint when in the last five years he’d cut it. Beneath his irritated expression, Dimitri could still see a little bit of amusement, fondness. Beneath it all, Felix was still Felix. Or at least as much as Dimitri could infer from a small square picture.

Dedue’s voice broke through Dimitri’s melancholy. “You could call him.”

Dedue was a bright light in a terribly shadowed time, but he had not known Felix and hadn’t known how they’d fallen out. “I do not think he would pick up,” Dimitri said. Dedue frowned at that and Dimitri quickly added, “Besides, I’d… I would like to talk to him in person.” One day. “It’s not.. it is complicated.”

Dedue did not look like he thought it was that complicated, but he refrained—at least tonight—from informing Dimitri as much.

♫ ♫ ♫

#### Present Day

♫ ♫ ♫

Felix was not running away. He was briskly pacing himself back to his life that did not include ex-bandmates (and other ex-things).

“Fuck me,” Felix said, ignoring the look a grip gave him as he passed. Dimitri was… when the hell did he start looking like _that_? How the hell did he look like that when Felix looked like this? He could not believe what he was wearing today. It figured that the day he ran into Dimitri would be the day he was wearing ripped jorts, an old oversized The Secret Merchant band shirt, and was still growing out his stupid impulsive haircut.

Dimitri was taller, his hair was longer, and there was a broadness to his shoulders he didn’t have five years ago. Felix wanted to kick himself for never doing the normal thing and social media stalking him like Annette pestered him to do. Maybe then he wouldn’t have spent a good five seconds trying to line up this Dimitri with his Dimi—no he was not going to start thinking like _that_.

“Are you all right, Felix?” Mercedes asked him almost immediately as he returned to their makeshift rehearsal space.

Felix opened his mouth to ask if they could leave, to detail the horrible history he’d never really gotten specifically into (even with Annie), but he’d spent years learning to suffer in silence and from a distance. A very far distance, so instinct took over and he said, “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Did you find the updated schedule?” Marianne asked.

Fuck. He’d completely forgotten why he’d gone that way in the first place. “No. I—wanted to check if you, uh, wanted something to drink?”

Mercedes was too perceptive. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Felix said. “I… just got a little sidetracked.”

He did not want to go back that way, but he also refused to hide. He’d spent enough time letting his life be run by whatever Dimitri’s wants were, he wasn’t going to continue that fucking bullshit now.

If only he were wearing better clothes. “Do you want anything?” Felix asked, while he readjusted the way his shirt was tucked in. Maybe it’d look… okay if it was only on the one side.

“Some water would be nice,” Marianne said. “Did you want someone to go with you this time?”

Yes. “No,” Felix said. “Tell Annie to text me when she gets back if she wants anything.”

“Felix,” Mercedes said, gently, and put a hand on his arm. “You can tell us if something is bothering you.”

“I…” Felix started, but then didn’t know how to finish.

Unfortunately for him, he didn’t have to. “Hey,” Ingrid said, from behind him. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” Felix said. Both Marianne and Mercedes were watching with open and unsubtle interest.

“I thought you knew,” Ingrid said. She huffed out an annoyed breath. “Sylvain _said_ you knew.”

“Why would Sylvain…” Felix whirled around on her. “His Highness is Dimitri? _That’s_ Sylvain’s other band member?”

“Yes,” Ingrid said. She hesitated for a moment and glanced over at Marianne and Mercedes before gesturing with her head to Felix to follow out of the rehearsal space. He followed, not that he wasn’t certain they were going to eavesdrop anyway.

“Dimitri shouldn’t be in a fucking band,” Felix snapped. “Especially in a huge, overwhelming crowd like this one. What the hell was Sylvain thinking?”

Ingrid smiled, but it was a little sad around the edges. “That’s what you immediately jump to?” She sighed and then pushed her hair (shorter than Felix’s at this point) behind her ears. “Dimitri seems to be doing pretty well.”

“Yeah, he’s great at pretending to be,” Felix said. The bitterness was old, stale, and rose like bile in his throat. “I need to go.”

He didn’t wait for her response and walked in the direction he’d come from. He was going to get the fucking updated schedule and then…

Felix didn’t get to decide what the ‘and then’ was, because seeing Sylvain, chatting with Dimitri and the person who must’ve been Dedue, made steam blow out his ears and he automatically strode towards them.

“Felix!” Sylvain said, too brightly to be sincere.

“There’s thousands of people watching this event,” Felix said, sharply. “Not to mention the crowds outside and the pressure of competition are you out of your fucking mind?”

Still. Was he still out of his mind? Felix was talking to Sylvain, but spared a glance towards Dimitri and immediately regretted it. He was definitely taller than the last time Felix saw him… he was taller than _Sylvain_ even.

“He’s fine,” Sylvain said, and slapped Dimitri on the arm. “Right, buddy?”

Dimitri was still staring at Felix (in this stupid fucking outfit) and didn’t even flinch in Sylvain’s direction. “Felix,” he said, and holy mother of fuck, even his voice was deeper. “I… apologize, Sylvain did not inform me that your band would be competing as well. I would have…” He trailed off.

Right. Some things weren’t different. The irritation was a familiar friend.

“Called?” Felix asked. “Texted? Made any sort of contact? You haven’t in half a decade, why start now?”

“Closer to four years technically,” Sylvain added, unhelpfully. Then, when Felix sharply turned his head to glare at him, Sylvain cleared his throat, smiled uneasily and tapped his other bandmate to walk away—giving the illusion of privacy, like they also weren’t eavesdropping.

Dimitri sighed and ran a hand through his hair. It was… jarring seeing it so long and honestly clean. The last time he’d seen Dimitri he’d…

“You didn’t seem like you wanted to speak with me considering how we left things,” Dimitri said.

Felix was still never sure if that was the worst day of his life or if it was when Glenn died, but the two were so intrinsically linked that it didn’t matter. “Whatever. That’s… you shouldn’t be in a band, let alone this competition.”

Dimitri shifted on his feet. It was a habit Felix remembered, whenever he was too shy to actually say what he meant and seeing it again in person twisted something in Felix’s chest.

“I appreciate your concern,” Dimitri said, ignoring Felix’s responding scoff, “but I am doing much better now.”

“I hope you’re taking your fucking meds,” Felix said, without really thinking about it.

Dimitri stared at him and very seriously said, “Yes, actually. I have been seeing a new doctor and the medication combination I was prescribed has been very helpful.”

Felix didn’t know what to do with that. That was… that was five years too late. “Good,” he angrily snapped.

Dimitri raised his eyebrows and Felix felt like his face was on fire. He turned his head, refusing to make eye contact anymore. The silence stretched too long and Felix breathed out and shoved his hands into his jorts pockets which were of course hanging down past the shredded seams so looked ridiculous when he put his hands all the way through.

“I have to go,” Felix said. He tried to say he was glad that Dimitri was doing better, he tried pushing it out of his mouth, but nothing came. So Felix walked off before Dimitri could respond—if he was going to.

Felix found the updated schedule and then headed back to the girls.

♪

The hotel bar was quiet this early in the afternoon, which Dimitri found preferable at the moment. Sylvain, however, was not preferred or quiet.

“I’m sorry,” Sylvain said, for what seemed like the thousandth time. He placed a drink in front of Dimitri and at Dimitri’s raised brow added, “It’s soda.”

Dimitri rubbed his temples. “Why didn’t you tell me his band was also in the competition?”

“I wasn’t sure if he’d actually follow through,” Sylvain said, “and I didn’t want to get your hopes up. I really didn’t think—”

“You’re right,” Dimitri cut him off. “You didn’t.”

Sylvain sighed and rested his forehead on the bar. “Please, Ingrid’s pissed. Felix’s pissed. I cannot deal with you being pissed too.”

Dimitri took a sip of the soda, unsure what it was supposed to taste like, but appreciative of the caffeine and fizz at least. It was difficult to stay angry with Sylvain. Other than Dedue, he was the only friend Dimitri had these days. As nice as it was to catch up with Ingrid, she had been scarce after the accident—not as much as Felix—but still with the distance they’d inevitably grown apart.

“Sylvain, what exactly was your plan?”

Sylvain lifted his head slightly. “Getting the band back together? But like… metaphorically.” He pushed himself up to sitting and rubbed his hands over his face before dropping them with a slap to his lap. “I wanted him to see how well you’re doing and I thought… I _hoped_ enough time passed that he wouldn’t…”

“Be Felix?” Dimitri asked.

Sylvain snorted and then shrugged, helplessly. “At least he seemed concerned?”

“His concern was never the issue,” Dimitri said. He drank more of his soda, so he’d have something to swallow. He had wanted to reach out to Felix more than once, but so much time had passed that it seemed wrong to drop himself into, from what little he knew, was a very good life. Felix deserved that kind of life.

“I’m _really_ sorry, Dimitri,” Sylvain said, a bit more earnest this time.

“You meant well,” Dimitri said. Then he frowned. “This wasn’t the only reason we entered the competition, was it?”

Sylvain scoffed. “No, we’re going to win this and finally get some groupies.”

“Your priorities are always remarkably mature,” Dimitri said.

Sylvain grinned at him—a hint of relief behind it—and shrugged.

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

“I know!” Constance von Nuvelle, the instrumental accompaniment expert, of the Ashen Wolves preened. While still holding the mic that she’d stolen from Flayn moments earlier. “You would think with my obvious and accomplished list of talents that there’d be no question as to who would be the lead!” She cleared her throat and held the mic like it was one to use on stage. “Tra-la-laa la-laa... Sing out over p—”

Constance cut off suddenly, as her bandmate Yuri Leclerc, lead guitarist, snatched the mic from her. “I think that’s enough, Shady Lady. Wouldn’t want our videographer friends to get too much before the show.”

She made a face at him and Yuri handed the mic back to Flayn. “Thank you,” Flayn said, and then like a professional held the mic back up to Yuri. “Is it true as well, that you have a long singing background, professionally one might say, and if so why do you not also sing?”

Yuri smiled, but Ignatz could tell there wasn’t much behind it. He hoped that came through on camera. “Why don’t we direct focus to the person who _actually_ does all the singing before Balthus decides it’s time to take his shirt off yet again.”

“Too late,” Hapi, the occasional bassist (usually bored manager), with no last name (strangely), said. She gestured behind, where Balthus von Albrecht, the Ashen Wolves’ drummer had in fact taken his shirt off. It was one of his signature moves.

Yuri sighed and put a hand to his temple, but Ignatz had to move the camera as Flayn was headed straight towards the famed Byleth Eisner, the person who supposedly had the voice of the Goddess. “You recently joined the Ashen Wolves, yes?”

“Yes,” Byleth said. There was an awkward pause as Flayn seemed to assume that they would continue.

Flayn shrugged it off. “How did you make your choice? After being so desperately fought for by so many bands?”

Byleth stared blankly at Flayn. Then they shrugged.

Flayn wasn’t able to get another word out of them for the rest of the interview and Ignatz couldn’t get any shots other than Byleth staring off into space, or nodding when asked a question by their bandmates.

He’d be in the editing room for a while for this one.

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

Ingrid wiped the sweat off her brow after a great rehearsal and productive soundcheck. According to the schedule they’d be up against The Secret Merchant tomorrow. Ingrid didn’t know much about them other than Sylvain’s childhood posters, but she knew the lead singer Anna had insane merch sales.

“That was AWESOME!” Caspar said, as exuberantly as usual. Ingrid couldn’t help but smile as he and Raphael slapped their fists together. “You really railed it, Ingrid,” Caspar added, grinning.

Ingrid shrugged and spun one of her sticks around in her fingers. She wasn’t showing off exactly, but something about being in a band full of boys made her feel like peacocking now and again. If only to show dominance.

“I think it went well,” Ashe said, but he was looking at something on his phone. Knowing Ashe it was probably the recording he’d taken of their set. “We might want to slow down on the second verse of Sword of Kyphon, I don’t want to lose the ambiance.”

Caspar snorted and then wrapped an arm around Ashe. “Ambiance.”

“Caspar,” Ashe said, turning slightly pink. “Cut it out.”

Raphael stretched his arms overhead. “I’m gonna load everything up again. It’s such a great workout.”

“We’ll never need a roadie,” Ingrid agreed, enjoying Raphael’s booming laugh in response.

She stretched her arms too, sticking her drumsticks in her back pocket out of habit. The thrill of playing, even during a soundcheck was always a nice break from…

“Sylvain,” Ingrid said, exasperatedly as she saw him approach. “What are you doing here?”

“You sound great!” Sylvain said, far too enthusiastically and holding something behind his back.

“What do you want?” Ingrid asked.

“I come in peace,” Sylvain said and then his hand appeared from behind him with a literal bouquet of beef jerky. It was a good thing Raphael was loading up.

“Seriously, Sylvain?” Ingrid asked. “You think a snack joke is going to smooth all of this over?”

She’d somehow bothered him for once, which Ingrid supposed was a good thing if she was getting through to him. But she didn’t like the way his face fell a little as he said, “So you don’t want it?”

“I didn’t say that,” Ingrid said and snatched it from his hand. She ignored his annoying beaming grin in response and broke off a piece before taking a bite.

Sylvain, being Sylvain, immediately took advantage of the fact that her mouth was full. “I love watching you eat.”

She flipped him off.

Sylvain laughed and then rubbed the back of his neck. “Ah, so have you seen Felix?”

Ingrid swallowed. “Why, do you have a jerky bouquet for him too?”

“Ingrid,” Sylvain said, pretending to be offended, “I only bring this kind of quality to my best girl. I wouldn’t waste that on Felix. Besides he’d rather get something sharp and I don’t think he should have that right now.”

Ingrid sighed. She wondered when she’d ever have a chance to stop worrying about her friends, especially this particular tall, handsome, extremely annoying friend. “Why are you so obsessed with getting us all in the same room?”

It wasn’t the first time he’d tried to pull this, but it had been less than effective with both Felix and Ingrid at schools across the country. Especially with Ingrid usually too broke and Felix always refusing to come home for any major holiday. Refusing to talk to his father or Dimitri mostly. Hm… maybe Sylvain had a point.

She wouldn’t say that out loud, though.

“I don’t know, Ingrid,” Sylvain said, in a way that meant he absolutely knew but was avoiding thinking about it. “We were really happy. Four peas in a pod as it were. The Faerghus Four.”

“No one called us that, you kept trying to make it catch on and no one wanted it.”

Sylvain stole a piece of her apology jerky and bit it off out of spite. She let him, mostly because it wasn’t possible for her to finish eating it on her own (before Raphael got back) and conduct a conversation at the same time.

“Felix and Dimitri haven’t been in the same room together in almost five years, don’t you think it was overdue?”

Ingrid sighed. “Maybe, but this wasn’t the way to go about it. You know how those two are.”

“Yeah, _I_ do,” Sylvain said.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Ingrid asked, taking a step forward. She must have looked intimidating because Sylvain took a step back.

“You barely visit, Ingrid.”

Ingrid tried to bite down on her frustration, but she had such short nerves when it came to him. “Are you kidding me? Sylvain, not everyone has a trust fund. Plane tickets are expensive.” To say the least of it. Not to mention taking off time from work from her side jobs _and_ losing out on potential gigs for the band.

Sylvain frowned. “You could respond to my texts.”

Ingrid raised her eyebrows. “Is this about me visiting home or me not being at your beck and call anymore?”

“Hey!” Sylvain said. “That’s not fair. I don’t need you cleaning up my messes anymore.”

“Good, because I don’t have time or patience for it,” Ingrid said.

Sylvain crossed his arms, looking hurt, but she refused to give in. He sighed. “Can you help me clean up the Felix and Dimitri mess? For old time’s sake.”

“You are unbelievable,” Ingrid said.

“That isn’t a no.” A flicker of a smirk appeared on his face.

“Buy me dinner,” Ingrid said. Then reconsidered. “Buy my band dinner.”

Sylvain snorted and then eased himself into a ridiculous bow, gesturing the way. “Of course, milady.”

Ingrid flipped him off again she passed and then took another bite of the jerky.

♪

Ingrid let Sylvain know where Felix was, which he probably should have figured out on his own. There was a cat cafe within a two block radius of the hotel, so of course Felix was there.

Felix had an untouched cup of coffee on a table, a patchy calico on his lap, and a pink Crest Phone with cat ears in his hands.

“I might say the phone is a little much, but I respect you going on theme,” Sylvain said.

Felix didn’t even look at up at him. “It’s Annette’s phone.”

“Why are you using Replacement Redhead’s phone?” Sylvain asked, taking the opportunity to sit on the chair across from him and skritch patchy’s back. The cat didn’t seem to appreciate that and dug its claws into Felix before jumping off.

Felix swore under his breath and pressed his palm against his leg. “They’re not dogs, Sylvain.”

“Sorry,” Sylvain said. “You didn’t answer my question.”

Felix shrugged and continued to do whatever he was doing with the phone, so Sylvain got up and hovered above him to see. “Is that Dimitri’s Indechgram feed?”

“Yes and it’s useless, it’s all pictures of his boyfriend cooking and Dad’s fucking cat, Aegis.”

“You know he got the cat to lure you back home,” Sylvain said. He thought about correcting Felix on the Dedue is not Dimitri’s boyfriend thing, but decided to shelve it for later.

Felix grunted without appreciation and kept scrolling.

“So,” Sylvain said, stretching out and leaning up against Felix’s chair. “Using Replacement Redhead’s phone to cyber stalk without a trail?”

“No. I couldn’t remember my password,” Felix said.

“17Zoltan,” Sylvain said.

Felix finally looked up from the phone and stared up at him, blinking. “The fuck do you know that?”

Sylvain shrugged. “I helped you set up, which by the way you suck at updating. I only see pictures of you when Ingrid or one of your bandmates tag them.” He leaned over Felix a little more, trying to see how far along he’d gotten in Dimitri’s feed. “Why are you cyber stalking anyway?”

“He looks different, I was surprised,” Felix said. The slight blush on his face made it clear what that was about.

“Look on my feed,” Sylvain said. “I’ve got more pictures there.”

Felix frowned and clicked into Sylvain’s IG (he supposed he should be touched Felix remembered his handle, then again star69whilewe69 was hard to forget). Felix hit a slew of photos of mostly Sylvain looking good with a flirty caption, because it was what Indechgram was for and then stopped on a picture of him and Dimitri at the beach.

“Fuck,” Felix said under his breath. Then he tried to zoom in, which wasn’t even a thing possible on that app.

Sylvain could not resist laughing, so he thought the dull punch Felix swung at his stomach was fair. He wheezed and sat down in the chair again, enjoying the fact that Felix and one of the cats behind him had the same pissed off face. “Have you _seriously_ not seen a picture of Dima since…” He cleared his throat and tried to smooth over it. “I shouldn’t be surprised, but come on Felix, your _dad_ friended me on Fódlanbook and even Sparchat.”

“I don’t have Fódlanbook and what the hell is Sparchat?”

They were distracted by a kitten scampering across their feet—Felix’s mood lifting a little. Sylvain waited until it scampered back around to snatch it up into the air. Apparently the little fluff ball was not in the mood to snuggle because it tried to fight Sylvain’s hand. He put it down and picked up one of those feathered toys lying around instead.

Sylvain cleared his throat. “I honestly didn’t know you were that out of touch with… you know, how hot he is now.”

Not that Dimitri hadn’t always been annoyingly attractive. It was the main reason they’d pushed him past his social anxiety to be the frontman of the Blue Lions. Girls swooned. Boys swooned. People who didn’t fit the gender binary swooned. It was unmatched.

Until everything went to shit of course.

“I don’t care,” Felix said, clearly a lie. “But it would’ve been _nice_ to get some warning so I didn’t run into Dimitri—who looks like _this_.” He held the phone up to Sylvain—an (unintentional) thirst shot of Dimitri wearing an old shirt way too tight for him reading the back of a breakfast cereal box. “While wearing _this_.” Felix gestured to himself.

Sylvain looked him over. Knowing Felix this long he hadn’t really given a second thought to the stupid clothes he was wearing, but now that he was taking it in, the high boots, faded and ripped The Secret Merchant t-shirt (which Sylvain was pretty sure was his, lousy thief), and oh sweet Goddess—“It is not my fault you are wearing jorts.”

Felix glared at him. “We’ve been texting about your stupid band for months. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Why didn’t you listen to any of the tracks I sent?” Sylvain retorted.

Felix frowned at him and went back to scrolling on the phone. “I was going to.” Then he looked up. “Dimitri’s singing?”

“Yeah,” Sylvain said and held his hand out for the phone, which Felix gave him after a slight hesitation. Sylvain looked up The Silver Maiden’s social feed and gave it back to him. “We’re not bad, although the songs could use some work, especially the lyrics. Honestly, I kinda pulled some nepotism bullshit getting us in this contest, but don’t tell Dedue and Dimitri that.”

“Why would I even talk to them?” Felix asked, keeping his focus on the phone where he was obsessively staring the curated (intentional) thirst shots of his ex-boyfriend, sweaty and singing.

Honestly, Sylvain had cultivated Dimitri’s social media presence because he was trying to get him out more (and laid)—the fact that it seemed to be working on Felix…

“How long are you going to hold a grudge, Fe?” Sylvain asked softly.

Felix put the phone down and looked up at him. “You weren’t there.”

Of course he wasn’t. While everyone else was dealing with their lives falling apart—Felix’s brother, Ingrid’s boyfriend, and Dimitri’s parents dying in the same night—Sylvain was busy getting arrested when Miklan tried to frame him for the meth he’d apparently stashed in his car.

“He’s better,” Sylvain said, dangling the feather toy in front of the fur ball. “He’s going to therapy now, on new medication, he’s even moved out of your old man’s place.”

“I knew that part,” Felix said. “My father calls on my birthday… and Glenn’s. I’m not a dick, I pick up.” Felix looked a little lost, staring down at his untouched coffee. He tapped his fingers against the table. “I hope he’s doing better.”

“He is,” Sylvain insisted, but he could tell Felix wasn’t letting himself believe it. Sylvain never did get the full story of how they broke up out of either of them, but he did remember the tail end of loud arguments about how no one was paying attention to the fact Dimitri wasn’t only having trouble grieving.

“Dress hot tomorrow,” Sylvain said.

Felix dropped the sad eyes and looked up at him confusion. “What?”

“Dress hot tomorrow, even the playing field. Avenge your jorts.”

Felix rolled his eyes at him and looked at the kitten still entranced with Sylvain’s feather toy. “Do I even want to know what dressing hot is to you?”

“Probably not, I’d ask Replacement Redhead and Ample Bosom for tips.”

Felix glared at him. “Knock it off.”

“Annette and Mercedes,” Sylvain said, easily and fought a grin. “I’d say that shy drummer of yours too, but I don’t think dressing intentionally sexy is her style.”

“Don’t fuck my bandmates,” Felix said, for like the millionth time.

“That’s not fair, Felix, you fucked one of mine!”

Felix’s response got them both kicked out of the cat cafe.

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

“Nerves?” Dorothea Arnault, songstress and occasional lead of the Black Eagle Strike Force, asked with a laugh. “What are those?”

“They are part of your biology to indicate to your brain that a touch or injury has occurred,” Petra Macneary, the drummer of the Black Eagles said.

A deep sigh came from behind Petra. Ferdinand von Aegir, who Ignatz suspected was the one always changing the Black Eagles Wikipedia article to boast about his skills at guitar and singing over Edelgard’s, shook his head. “She means nervousness.”

“Yes, I know,” Petra said. “I am telling a joke.”

Flayn laughed easily and switched her focus. She seemed pleased not to have lift the microphone quite as high when she pointed it at the famous Edelgard von Hresvelg, the axe champion, guitar shredder and frontwoman of the Black Eagle Strike Force. “Edelgard, are you also free of nerves from today’s competition?”

“I would say we’re confident,” Edelgard said, sharing a smile with Dorothea and Petra, and then more hesitantly Ferdinand. “We worked very hard to get here and I am certain our determination and skill will show through our inevitable victory.”

“This round or the entire competition?” Flayn asked, with a small smile.

Edelgard was mildly intimidating for such a short person—Ignatz resisted taking a step back as she stared directly into the camera. “Black Eagle Strike Force is _winning_ the Battle of the Bands and Seiros Records can provide our next years worth of tour funds.”

“That is a good cut,” said Edelgard’s manager, who Ignatz kept trying and failing to get on camera. It wasn’t really disproving the theory that Hubert von Vestra was a dark spirit summoned to protect Edelgard.

“Hubert,” Edelgard said, chiding. “You can’t tell the documentarians when to cut their own film.”

“I am merely offering a suggestion, of which they should take if they prefer to have a cleaner final copy.” His smile was thin and slightly horrifying. “After all, you will be winning.”

“Yes!” Ferdinand said. “Of that is surely a fact.”

“Your confidence is inspiring,” Flayn said, shooting Ignatz a look to indicate they needed to wrap this up.

Ignatz tried again to get Hubert on camera, but he seemingly disappeared into the shadows.

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

Felix had his laptop up and was putting the final tweaks on their setlist order when Sylvain’s exhaustive groan alerted him to his presence.

“Felix,” Sylvain said, “that is _not_ what I told you to wear!”

Felix flicked his eyes up towards his very annoying best friend, and took the excuse to have another sip of his coffee. “Morning, Sylvain.”

He would’ve been more annoyed, but it was good to know now they were staying at the same hotel so he could avoid the rest of The Silver Maidens until the competition was over.

“I’m going back up,” Sylvain said, and then disappeared.

Felix went back to his coffee and the setlist. He was trying to decide if he’d move Dungeon Song after Box Song, when Sylvain returned with Annette in tow.

“You let him out of the house like that?” Sylvain balked. “What kind of replacement redhead are you?”

“Hm, you know he has a point, Felix,” Annette said, the traitor.

“Did he tell you why he wants me to dress up?” Felix asked.

“Dress hot,” Sylvain grunted, “I said dress hot. I didn’t say wear a ballgown.”

Annette looked him up and down. “You’re wearing leggings and an oversized sweatshirt.”

Felix didn’t point out that the sweatshirt was kind of a prerequisite to any leggings related decisions so he covered up his lower half. Mostly he’d thrown on whatever out of spite. After spending the night looking over Dimitri’s social media feeds, it was clear nothing Felix wore was going to give him the upper hand.

“Please,” Annette said, big eyed and holding her hands together like a prayer. Sylvain was behind her giving his best hangdog look to back her up.

“I hate both of you,” Felix said, snapping his laptop shut.

Annette and Sylvain high fived each other (or attempted to and failed, then tried again with Annette jumping and Sylvain crouching). He followed them back upstairs to his room and set the laptop down gesturing to his clothes, still mostly in his suitcase. “Knock yourself out.”

“You got a single room?” Sylvain asked, walking around the hotel room like it was Felix’s apartment.

“He doesn’t appreciate the _nooooise_ ,” Annette said, already digging into Felix’s clothes. “Apparently we girls are too loud for his creative juices to flow.”

“I wrote you a new song,” Felix pointed out.

When he glanced up, Sylvain was staring at him. “You’re still writing?”

Felix didn’t like the look he was giving him and shrugged. “Yeah. I write most of our stuff.”

Annette threw a pair of black skinny jeans onto the bed next to Felix and continued her search. “He’s really talented!”

“I know,” Sylvain said, petty and indignant. He’d bitched more about Felix moving cross-country than his father had. “I just thought…” Sylvain raked his hand through his hair and then whatever thought he had he shook off and went to help Annette sort through Felix’s clothes.

“You’re refolding those,” Felix said.

“Like you even care!” Annette said.

“At least some things don’t change,” Sylvain said, dramatically sighing afterwards.

Felix waited impatiently while they debated whether he should wear a mesh see-through shirt (which was an undershirt for _working out_ and Felix immediately vetoed that idea) or an old tank that was split on the sides all the way to his hips.

Then Sylvain murmured something to Annette and then they both left, promising they’d be back soon. Felix hoped so, they had to be at the fucking field in two hours.

He opened his laptop, ready to tweak the set again, but couldn’t focus so checked his email instead. Mostly spam, but as Felix scrolled down he remembered that he had set all of Sylvain’s band emails to unread so he could listen to them when he got a spare moment. Felix clicked one of the links, the song title was an emoji made to look like a penis and Felix rolled his eyes before clicking play.

They had a keyboardist, or sound mixer, Felix heard that immediately and had to admit whoever they were, they weren’t bad. The lead-in music grew slowly and set the pace of the song. Sylvain’s bass playing—thrumming in a steady way that never undermined the melody—was easy to recognize. Then Felix heard Dimitri.

He’d been right before. Dimitri’s voice was deeper. There was a gravel to it now that Felix never heard on their old stuff (not that he’d listened to it since they’d broken up), like a hitch or record scratch in Dimitri’s former smooth baritone. If anything it made Dimitri sound better, more mature to match his already deep voice. It suited him.

Even if Felix could admit that… he felt a million miles away, like the chasm he’d forced between himself and everyone else had finally worked. If Dimitri _was_ better then maybe it had been the right choice. It wasn’t like he’d tried to get better for Felix.

Felix slapped the laptop shut the second he heard the door rattle—even though it had locked automatically. His heart was racing like he was doing something illicit and he shook his head at himself, before getting up to let Sylvain and Annette back in.

Annette was holding up eyeliner and Sylvain had two items that were definitely Mercedes and Annette’s. Felix tried to close the door on them again, but Sylvain laughed and wedged his shoulder in to keep it open.

Annette scooted down beneath the space under Sylvain’s arm and beamed at Felix. “Don’t think about it like looking really good for your ex, think about it like looking really good for the competition!”

“I have eyeliner,” Felix muttered. And if he didn’t, he didn’t want an eye infection from borrowing some. “I didn’t think that look really worked for our vibe.”

Annette laughed. “It’s perfect! You’ll be the sour apple candy to my bubble gum! It’s exactly our vibe.”

That was… kind of hard to argue with. “Fine,” Felix said, snatching the clothes from Sylvain.

♪

Dimitri felt unease watching The Secret Merchant play (and not only because Anna somehow looked exactly the same as she had in Sylvian’s childhood poster). If an established band such as them were playing here, he wasn’t sure that The Silver Maiden wasn’t moving forward too early.

It wasn’t as if he was unaware that the heir apparents to two of the largest production companies in a single band gave them an edge to gaining a spot. Dimitri was starting to wonder if they weren’t setting themselves up for a disappointment.

The cold shallow lurch running through Dimitri’s body was familiar. He couldn’t help think of Felix’s objections. What if this was too much pressure for him?

There was a warm, strong hand on his shoulder and Dimitri looked up to see Dedue’s concerned face. Dimitri forced a smile, so he wouldn’t worry him. “Nerves.”

Dedue nodded. “Would you like to come with me? A friend of mine is also in the competition.”

“Oh?” Dimitri’s smile felt a little easier. “I didn’t know that. Which band?”

“Shhh,” Sylvain hissed, not taking his eyes off the stage.

“I think they are going by Hilda & the Schemers now,” Dedue said. “They’ve changed names a few times.”

Dimitri tried to remember if he’d seen them yet, but couldn’t place it. “Ah, well— _yes_ , Sylvain—we’ll leave you be, there’s no need to shove.”

“Be back before Ingrid’s set,” Sylvain said, as Dimitri and Dedue left to the rest of the set.

They walked through Gronder Field proper to get to the staging area. It was easy to move amongst the crowds, as they had yet to perform and Dimitri highly doubted they had the kind of notoriety that would cause any issue.

“There are a lot of people here,” Dimitri said, for want of a better description of his current state of mild distress. None of them were looking at him now, but they would be tomorrow. He didn’t know why he once again agreed to be the frontman.

“You should not doubt yourself,” Dedue said, as if it were that easy. “Do you doubt me or Sylvain?”

“No, of course not,” Dimitri said. And even by knowing the logic his friend was getting at, it didn’t particularly help his brain make the connection so that he felt it. “Its merely… a lot of pressure.”

“You didn’t seem worried about pressure before we ran into your old friend,” Dedue said. The way he said ‘old friend’ made Dimitri snort. “He was very critical.”

Dimitri smiled softly at Dedue’s concern. “Felix was always better at expressing himself in music than he was verbally, but even so…” The smile dropped from his face and he frowned. “It is hard to see someone at their worst.”

“Yes,” Dedue agreed. “However, it is also then easier to see when they are no longer there.”

Dimitri smiled again and nudged Dedue with his arm. Dedue smiled back at him.

They found Dedue’s friend easily enough once they made their way back into the staging area, or at least who Dimitri assumed was his friend, from the easy wave the man gave. “Hey, Dedue. How’s it going?”

“Claude,” Dedue said, with a nod and then gestured to Dimitri. “This is Dimitri.”

Claude’s smile was sharp, but not unfriendly. “I know, I have appropriately scoped out the competition. Although looking at the line up, we won’t be competing unless you make it to the final four.”

“Are you that confident in your chances?” Dedue asked.

Claude shrugged, smiled again and then shoved his hands in his pockets. “I have pretty good odds.” He perked up slightly. “Oh, but you should both come to the party tonight. It’s at the Gloucester High Rises’ penthouse, behind the Eagle and Lion hotel, just off Thyrsus Ave.”

That was walking distance, Dimitri noted. “Is it all right if we bring our other bandmate?”

“You’ll have to ask Hil,” Claude said, fighting a grin. “She might still be mad at him.”

“I apologize for his behavior,” Dedue said and Dimitri immediately didn’t want to know. It was possible Dedue didn’t know and it was a general statement given Sylvain.

“Oh, Hilda can take it as good as she gives it, don’t worry,” Claude reassured Dedue. He glanced behind his shoulder. “Ah speak of the pink haired devil.”

Dimitri turned to see their band’s namesake, a short girl with pink pigtails, arguing with… Felix. The strangeness of it took Dimitri a moment and he made to step back, but Claude gestured them close enough to overhear and observe without being indiscreet enough to be noticed — Dimitri would have to keep an eye out for Claude, based on how easy it was for him to do so.

Dimitri was attempting to not to stare, but it was difficult not to do so. He hadn’t see Felix in a very long while and he had never seen Felix wearing something… such as he was. Tight dark jeans were slung very low on his hips, which left the skin uncovered from there and up his torso, as the dark blue t-shirt (emblazoned with a design that might have been a wolf) he was wearing only made it to his navel. Felix kept up with his obsessive fitness routine, Dimitri noticed. From what little he’d seen of Felix on social media—he was usually too covered to tell—but his arm muscles and the thick line of muscle leading to his hips were very exposed at the moment and his muscular definition implied he had not been lacking in that area.

Hilda stomped her foot, drawing Dimitri back to sanity. “Felix! Why are you such a clit blocker! Let me talk to your cute drummer.”

“No,” Felix said, immovable. “You’re trying to mess around before we perform and put Marianne off her game.”

Hilda gasped, slightly dramatic. “Felix? I’m only a small girl in a small band, how could I possibly think such a devious scheme to confuse and distract the competition right before they perform?”

Felix didn’t look impressed. “Cut the shit.”

“Ugh,” Hilda said. Then she smiled prettily and leaned up. “Maaaaybe it started that way, but don’t you think I also really might want to talk to her? She’s so nice and cute and the way she plays the drums like a demon matches none of that!”

“Cut the shit,” Felix said again. He put his hands on his hips, emphasizing the stretch of skin exposed there. He did not seem to be doing it intentionally, Dimitri had to remind himself as he drew his gaze back up to a less invasive angle.

“I am!” Hilda insisted. She twirled her finger around the thinner part of her pink pigtail. “What if it’s after you perform today? Would my motives seem pure then? Could you let one of your poor delicate band members make a decision for herself then?”

“Yeah whatever,” Felix said, then frowned. “I’ll slash your tires if you fuck her around.”

Hilda laughed and grabbed Felix’s arm in a way that made Dimitri tighten his jaw. Her hands were pressing the bare skin of his bicep, very familiarly. “How ‘bout you, Mercie, Annie, and sweet drummer Blue come to the party tonight?”

Felix stared at her for a moment and then scoffed and said, “Fine.” Then he turned to walk off. Dimitri couldn’t help notice the way his boots crawled up his thigh and how much tighter his jeans seemed from that angle.

Hilda spun around the opposite way and made for their direction. She seemed to know immediately where they were and sighed dramatically, leaning against Claude. “It didn’t work.”

“I told you it wouldn’t,” Claude said, patting her head. “Felix is like a bulldog when it comes to his band.”

“She is _really_ cute though, Claude,” Hilda whined and then after Claude patted her head a few more times she seemed to notice Dimitri and Dedue. Or at least Dedue, because she squeaked his name and jumped up to throw her arms around his middle.

Dedue smiled and patted her back in much the same way Claude had patted her head. “I see you are still causing the same trouble.”

“Only if I’m bored,” Hilda said, releasing him and beaming up before turning her sights to Dimitri. “You must be Dimitri, I have heard so much about you!”

“I…” Dimitri felt a little caught off guard. He’d assumed Claude was Dedue’s friend, but perhaps it was this Hilda. Neither of which he’d heard much about from Dedue and they lived together. “Yes, it is nice to meet you.”

“Hilda,” Claude said, “don’t torture him. He seems a gentle giant.”

Dimitri didn’t know what to make of _that_ , but when he looked at Dedue, his friend looked faintly amused. “I had not properly warned you,” Dedue said to Dimitri as Hilda had turned to Claude to argue the definition of torture. “Hilda and I met at school. She severely disliked the gym and appreciated when I informed her that botany also covered the same electives.”

“Ah,” Dimitri said, feeling a little better. He’d remembered Dedue mentioning his friends from school in that regard at least. “The one who donated to your community garden last year?” He didn’t ask how she knew Sylvain, Dimitri always knew the origin of that connection when it cropped up.

Dedue nodded and his lips twitched slightly. “She felt it needed more color.”

“I can see that,” Dimitri said, watching Hilda and Claude continue their argument.

They stayed for a bit conversing (and Dimitri managed _not_ to ask how Hilda knew Felix well enough for casual touching) and then made their way back to Sylvain to catch Ingrid’s band perform. The Valiant Knights were not the kind of music Dimitri generally enjoyed playing, but he had to admit that they melded well together and it was a good fit for Ingrid’s fervor on the drums.

“She’s like a windstorm,” Sylvain said, in awe as Ingrid threw a stick into the air, caught it and continued her loud drum solo. Sylvain didn’t tear his eyes off the stage, which Dimitri and Dedue both noted. Once they finished, Sylvain hooted loudly enough that Dimitri had to step away from him, which considering how loud Ingrid’s band played was impressive.

The Valiant Knights, with audience approval (Sylvain enthusiastically included) progressed to the next round. There was even enough time to grab Ingrid and lunch before the Swamp Beasties made the stage. Save Dedue who had gone to meet up with Hilda and Claude again. Dimitri felt a little out of place being so close to the stage, but Ingrid and Sylvain had insisted.

“Felix looks good,” Ingrid said, sounding surprised.

“You’re welcome,” Sylvain said, with an easy grin and a leering look in Dimitri’s direction.

Dimitri didn’t want to know, but felt he was going to ask anyway—then they were cut off as the band started playing. They had an interesting sound to them. Annette had a sweet, peppy voice and energy that she drew into her performance, paired with the conflicting mood of mature and occasionally somber lyrics. Somehow the arrangement, strong musical accompaniment, and tone did not make it a dissonant mix. They were…. good.

Felix was closer to the back than the front and there were no guitar solos to draw attention or any particular music cue that would overshadow the other instruments. It mattered little. Dimitri could still feel his influence in each song. The composition, the tone, the lyrics. That was Felix.

“I hate how good they are,” Sylvain said, between songs. “ _Hate_ it.”

“I would hope they’d be this good with how much time they spend practicing,” Ingrid said, she glanced over at Dimitri, as if making a purposeful attempt at including him in the conversation (a gesture he both appreciated and felt uncomfortable was necessary). “Annette and Mercedes have shared a few choice descriptions of Felix’s insistence on constant training and rehearsals.”

“It… shows,” Dimitri said, compelled to respond, but unsure exactly what to say.

Sylvain grunted in annoyance and threw an arm around Ingrid and another around Dimitri. “Replacement Redhead got him into kickboxing as an outlet, but it hasn’t improved his mood much.”

“To you,” Ingrid pointed out, grinning at him.

Sylvain bumped her with his hip and Dimitri felt a sense of nostalgia sweep over him. There was a bit of bitterness that came with it as well, so he focused on the fact that the Swamp Beasties were starting their next song.

Felix had moved forward slightly. Annette had put her mic on the stand and Mercedes had switched to the keyboard. The opening melody was a stark contrast to the pep of the last few songs and the elegiac composition seemed to truly show off Annette’s vocal range. Dimitri felt as if he was staring too intently at Felix, concentration completely on his guitar, mouth moving slightly with each key change, bangs falling over his tilted head.

Dimitri forced himself to look away and noticed that there were tears streaming down Ingrid’s face. She had her hands clutched at her heart and Sylvain had pulled her in tighter. That was when Dimitri started paying closer attention to the lyrics.

The metaphors about sharp edges, broken swords, and ashes were put into better context when Dimitri thought of Ingrid’s reaction and he had to take Sylvain’s arm off his shoulder to leave the immediate area. The open expanse of field, with scattered crowds, suddenly seemed confining and Dimitri ignored Sylvain’s call of concern and went to find as much silence and privacy as he could manage given the setting.

There was no doubting that Felix had written that song. It was about Glenn.

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

“What drives you towards legends as your inspiration?” Flayn asked, holding the mic up to Ashe Ubert, the lead singer of Valiant Knights.

“I’ve given it a lot of thought it’s—”

“Because we’re LEGENDS!” Caspar Bergliez, the guitarist, shouted, while wrapping an arm around Ashe’s front, effectively cutting Ashe off and startling Linhardt von Hevring, their… well actually Ignatz hadn’t figured that out… awake.

“Yeah!” Raphael Kirsten, the bassist, cheered.

“Let Ashe finish,” Ingrid Galatea, the drummer, said. She stared them down, until both exuberant men mumbled apologies.

“Sorry,” Ashe said, directed to Ignatz and Flayn.

“It is fine,” Flayn said, politely, while Ignatz wondered how he was going to sound balance that outburst with the rest of the audio. “You were saying?”

Ashe smiled. “Yes. I think that there’s a lot of values from older legends. The themes of friendship, loyalty, and justice can really translate to today.”

“So you see yourself as Loog or Kryphon?” Flayn asked with a hint of mischief in her smile. It might not have been professional, but it did make a flush cross Ashe’s cheeks which looked good on film.

“Hah, neither. I’m… I mean mostly I write about who I’d like to be and what I see in others. I hope the songs are inspirational, but also…” He shrugged helplessly. “If not, I hope they’re loud and fun.”

“Now you can cheer,” Ingrid prompted. Caspar and Raphael hooted their enthusiasm while she hid a laugh behind her hand.

♫ ♫ ♫

#### Five Years Earlier

♫ ♫ ♫

The world felt hollow. Dimitri barely caught the tail-end of Rodrigue’s attempt at comforting words. “-ay as long as you need.”

He nodded and kept grounded in the fugue state of nothing as they somehow packed up his life into several suitcases and took them away from his home to another’s. The drive was familiar. He’d driven here enough to see Felix, but staying here was…

Dimitri didn’t know when or how they’d gotten into the house, but Rodrigue was directing Felix where to put Dimitri’s things, which was…

“No,” Dimitri said.

Rodrigue swallowed and looked away from him. “It’s the only room set up. We can… we can work something else tomorrow if that’s easier, but I…”

“No, I can’t,” Dimitri said again. He was somehow standing in front of Glenn’s door. He couldn’t take another thing from him.

Rodrigue was frowning. He looked tired and as he looked Dimitri over, he seemed to struggle. Was it difficult for him to look at Dimitri now? Dimitri couldn’t blame him.

“He can stay in my room,” Felix said. Dimitri had forgotten he was also standing there.

“That’s not appropriate,” Rodrigue said.

Felix snorted dryly. “Don’t worry neither of us are in the mood.”

Rodrigue pressed his fingers to his temple. “Felix… I don’t think that’s…”

Felix ignored him—put his hand into Dimitri’s and pulled him into his own room. Dimitri vaguely noticed the door closing and being helped out of his shoes. At some point he was in bed, lying down but not tired. And yet he was exhausted.

He was taking up too much room on the bed. He tried moving, but Felix was still holding his hand. “Try to get some sleep,” Felix said.

Dimitri tried. He wasn’t sure how much time had passed before he gave up on it. When he turned his head, Felix was sleeping and still turned towards him, eyelashes dark against his pale skin.

How could Dimitri love someone this much and yet ruin both their lives? This was all his fault.

Felix moved in his sleep and murmured something before his hand loosened its grip from Dimitri’s. Dimitri didn’t pull him closer, he merely turned to stare at the ceiling.

Glenn would’ve still been in Duscur right now—studying with his friends—if Dimitri hadn’t begged him to come see their performance. Dimitri’s parents would have been in their seats if they hadn’t gone to pick up him from the airport at Dimitri’s request.

Above him, in the dark, there were lights that shouldn’t have been there and the whisper of truth that it was all Dimitri’s fault. The sound of it was familiar. They had never lied to him.

♪

Sylvain knew he was sleep deprived (staying overnight in a holding cell did that to you), but he worried he was hallucinating when he saw Ingrid standing in front of the release station, arms crossed angrily.

Where the hell were his parents? Oh right. They didn’t give a shit. He figured he’d see one of the ten family lawyers though not…

“Ingrid?” Sylvain asked, after Officer Handsy patted him down (like he’d _take_ something from an empty holding cell). “What are you doing here?”

“What does it look like?” Ingrid asked, without expecting an answer. “I’m picking you up, from yet another excursion.”

“You… did you bail me out?” Sylvain asked, adjusting his jacket as they walked out of the police station.

“No,” Ingrid said. “Your father did. He asked if I’d go see you and knock some sense into you.”

Sylvain groaned. “He did not say that. Please tell me he did not say that.”

“Something to that effect,” Ingrid said. It was good to see her out of her room and out of her house, although the months of mourning hadn’t been kind to her and there were dark circles underneath her eyes that could give Felix a run for his money.

“Well… he shouldn’t have done that,” Sylvain said. “Not that I’m not grateful to you, but it’s none of his business. Minus the bailing out thing.”

“He’s worried about you,” Ingrid said. “ _I’m_ worried about you.”

“Don’t be,” Sylvain said. He stretched his arms above his head and eased a smile on his face. “Nothing sticks to me, remember? It’ll get washed out of the system with a few handshakes to judges. Not like I tried to smuggle drugs or something.”

“Sylvain,” Ingrid stopped and turned around to stare up at him. “You have to stop.”

“Stop what?”

“You’ve already blown your chances for a good college,” Ingrid said, digging it in. “Do you really want to keep pressing your luck until your parents stop deciding to bail you out for these… these… immature escapades?”

“Geez, Ingrid,” Sylvain said, shifting on his feet. He started walking again, even though he had no idea where they were going. Bus station probably, given that Ingrid didn’t have a car. “You’re making too much of it.”

“Are you desperate for attention?” Ingrid asked. Her face fell. “Is it… you know we’ve—I…”

Sylvan stopped again. He winced and pressed his knuckles to his face. “No. No. I don’t… I don’t know. It’s not you, okay? I’m not acting up to get attention from my friends, because we’re no longer hanging out all the time because—”

Glenn died.

The statement lingered in the air, unsaid. When Sylvain looked at Ingrid, she was gazing off into the distance. “This is the first time I’ve been out of the house in a while,” she said, softly.

He stared at her, wishing he could think of anything to make her smile again. If he had some ability to go back in time and fix things so they weren’t all broken… he’d have given anything for that.

“You have to stop acting out,” Ingrid said, turning back to him. Her gaze was frank, always saw right through him, which was why it was terrifying. “What Miklan did was horrible and how your parents reacted—it's a mess, but it’s not an excuse to waste your life over trivial matters and get into needless trouble.”

“I didn’t think anyone would notice,” Sylvain said. “I wasn’t… I wasn’t pushing for attention. I know everyone is going through stuff right now.”

Sleep deprivation had not helped him be more articulate.

Ingrid’s lips lifted a fraction. “Stuff. Mhm.” She wrapped her arms around herself.

“You cold?” Sylvain asked, and took his jacket off, putting it around her shoulders without thinking. He couldn’t understand the green eyes that stared at up at him or the quizzical press of her brow, but she shoved her arms through his jacket and zipped it up.

“Thank you,” Ingrid said.

“Least I could do,” Sylvain said. He resisted the urge to wrap an arm around her. All he wanted to do was drag all of them closer and everyone kept moving farther apart. It was like the glue that held them together was getting weaker—and Sylvain had the weakest link to it.

“Do more,” Ingrid said.

Sylvain breathed out. “I’ll… I’ll try okay?”

That seemed to be enough to sate her and she nodded. They did, in fact, walk to the bus stop.

♫ ♫ ♫

#### Present Day

♫ ♫ ♫

Ingrid felt a little out of place at the party. She’d been in a mood since hearing Felix’s song. It was silly to be so worked up about something this long after it happened. She didn’t even know if she was sad or mad about it.

A soft hand pressed to Ingrid’s arm, startling out of her morose mood. When she looked up it was a very pretty brunette woman with a kind face and the kind of smile that was a shade of dangerous. (Glenn had that smile.)

“You are far too pretty to be cooped up in a corner sulking,” the woman said.

“Oh, I’m ah,” Ingrid stumbled over her words, feeling immediately foolish. She didn’t know how to handle flirting. The woman seemed amused at least. “Ingrid,” she said.

“I know!” the woman said, and then patted the arm she was still touching. “Dorothea. I saw you perform today, you were astounding.”

Dorothea. The name clicked in Ingrid’s mind. “Oh, you’re in the Black Eagles?”

Dorothea sighed. “Black Eagle Strike Force, Edie and Ferdie insist we say the full name or else people will get _ideas_ that there are two bands.” Her momentary malaise switched back to cheer. “So why are you so sad, Ingrid? You won today! And against The Secret Merchant, that is nothing to sniff at.”

Ingrid did smile a little. Dorothea was nice and she was really proud of her band. “I’m happy about that.” Dorothea was staring at her expectantly, so Ingrid continued, despite not being usually comfortable opening up to strangers. “I was reminded of my first love. He died in a car accident five years ago.”

Dorothea moved her hand from Ingrid’s arm to her hand and squeezed. “Thought you were past it and it snuck up on you?”

Ingrid raised her eyebrows. “Yes. I… how did you know that?”

Dorothea’s smile was sad. “My mother died quite a while ago. Sometimes small things still catch me off guard and send me crying in the grocery store, even years later.”

“I’m sorry,” Ingrid said. Even though she hated when people said that to her.

Dorothea squeezed her hand again. “Not a worry, dear Ingrid. It’s part of living. And the maudlin helps the musical.”

Ingrid laughed a little. “I don’t think that’s something I’d be very good at. I’m not great at writing music or singing.” The words Glenn had used once were that she sounded like very pretty cat who had its tail stepped on. “Ashe writes most of our songs.”

“Suppose I should be flirting with him then,” Dorothea said, teasing her with a wink.

“He’s taken,” Ingrid said, attempting to sound sly about it, but not sure she pulled it off.

Dorothea snapped her fingers like she was disappointed, but was still smiling. “I’m going to assume you aren’t or else there’d be someone rushing me off at this point.”

Ingrid shook her head. “No competition in that regard.” She realized what she said and then felt her face flame and lost Dorothea’s hand to cover her face. “That’s not what I meant.”

Dorothea was laughing, definitely at her, but it didn’t sound mean. “Big flirt, I see,” Dorothea teased. She tugged at Ingrid’s wrist to reveal her face again. “Are you?” she asked, tilting her head slightly. “Into women, I mean.”

“Sometimes,” Ingrid said. “I’m, um, pan I think. I still haven’t figured out the whole label thing.” She felt like a person who existed who was good at the drums. There didn’t seem to be a lot of exhaustive push and pull in any direction to define herself otherwise.

Dorothea had very long beautiful hair, Ingrid was distracted by it, when she went to push it off her bare shoulders. “It is nice to have a name to put to it. Makes it real and not compulsory heterosexuality.” She laughed and shrugged. “Oh, I came here to talk about your drums and your pretty eyes, not my journey through queer theory.”

Ingrid still felt like her face was heated after the phrase ‘pretty eyes’ but she pushed forward. “The program said you write all your own songs?”

Dorothea preened a little. “Yes.” Then she sighed in a way that was both indulgent and annoyed, it was a familiar noise that Ingrid made often. “Not that Ferdie doesn’t try to insist on touching up the lyrics.”

“Is it cathartic?” Ingrid asked.

“Sometimes,” Dorothea said. “Not all of the songs are deep and meaningful, but there are a few personal gems thrown here and there.”

Ingrid wondered what it would be like if she could translate her feelings into a song, like Felix was always able to do. The fact that he was on stage, playing a song like that had been a marvel to her—even if it had taken her off guard. Ingrid had taken the maximum amount of free therapy offered by university to even be able to speak about Glenn in short sentences. Putting all of the complex feelings she couldn’t define either into music and words? That seemed impossible.

Ingrid had a nice time talking to Dorothea for the next half hour or so before they exchanged numbers. Ingrid would’ve been happy to stay in her corner all night, but then she caught eye of Dimitri and remembered how he’d been gone by the time the song ended. She promised to watch Dorothea perform tomorrow and made her way past the crowd of people in this overpriced penthouse towards Dimitri.

“Hey,” she said. “Wasn’t sure you’d be here.” At his furrowed brow, she tried to clarify that. “I mean, because crowds aren’t usually your thing.”

“We were personally invited,” Dimitri said, sounding a little tired. “It felt rude to skip. Although now that I’m here I don’t think they’d notice.”

“You do stand out a little,” Ingrid countered, smiling.

Dimitri gave a dry snort. “Is that a comment on my height or should I take it as an overall compliment?”

“Either,” Ingrid said.

There was a very small lift to Dimitri’s lips. “I have to admit I was a little disappointed when Sylvain’s particular methods of convincing didn’t work to get you to join The Silver Maiden.”

“You mean the phone calls, email blasts, and text messages?” Ingrid asked, feeling mildly annoyed at the memory. Especially the emails. He’d spent far too long in a photo editor when he could’ve been doing something useful. “Even if he’d been able to form convincing argument, I wouldn’t feel right dropping the Valiant Knights.”

“If they weren’t a factor?” Dimitri asked.

Ingrid bit her lip, but kept him in eye contact. “I don’t know. It’s… difficult for me sometimes, to remember what it was like.” She sighed. “I wish I had Sylvain’s ease about things, but I don’t. I’m not sure getting the band reunited would’ve solved all our issues.”

“I’ve found it therapeutic,” Dimitri said, seeming to smile at the last word as if it was particularly funny. “I am not sure if that is getting back into music itself or reigniting friendships, but…” He trailed off for a moment and looked off into the crowd.

“You left,” Ingrid said, softly. “During Broken Sword. Sylvain said it was better to leave you be, but I did want to check on you.”

Dimitri stared at the floor, so she couldn’t see if his smile reached his eyes. “Felix still knows how to hit the most vulnerable target with his lyrics.” He looked up and then shrugged. “I’m still learning the difference between a depressive episode and merely feeling sad, but I suspect it was the latter.”

She couldn’t blame him. Glenn had been one of his closest friends and he’d lost his parents at the same time. Not to mention, Felix’s ‘shattered pieces spread out wide, travel in the pockets of strangers’ lyric made Ingrid think about if any of the organs Glenn donated were still out there, living a life he’d never have. The metaphor probably hadn’t meant that, but the thought stuck with her like it was lodged in her chest.

“Come on,” Ingrid said. “Let’s get some fresh air and maybe socialize a bit.”

“If we must,” Dimitri said, droll, but he was smiling.

♪

“How come Hilda can fuck your bandmates?” Sylvain asked. As expected Felix turned around to glower at him, which was pacified slightly once Sylvain handed him a beer (in a bottle, because he did not trust whatever was in that keg).

Felix rolled his eyes at Sylvain and took a sip, before taking a step back to lean against the iron railing he’d been looking out at. “You don’t have to hump everything that moves, Sylvain.”

“I don’t _have_ to,” Sylvain agreed, earning another eye-roll. He took a spot next to Felix and leaned back against the railing. It gave a pretty good view of the party. From here he could see Lorenz still asking people to leave because apparently neither Hilda nor Claude had informed him they were having it. Sometimes he really loved Hilda.

“You were infuriatingly good today,” Sylvain added, looking down at Felix.

“Thanks,” Felix said. “I’ll tell Annette you said so.”

Sylvain resisted taking the bait, but only just. “What was with that slow one? Is it new?”

Felix shook his head. “No, we haven’t played it in a while, but it shows off Annette’s range and fits in well before Boom. Plus the mood switch means we make an impression, which is what we’re here for.”

“You’re not here to win?” Sylvain asked.

Felix’s mouth twisted. “Maybe a little.”

“There’s my competitive asshole,” Sylvain said with a laugh. This time the responding eye-roll was fond. “But, really, that song… I mean… you made Ingrid cry and Dimitri flee.”

Critical mistake on Sylvain’s part, not only mentioning Dimitri but specifically Dimitri in what he liked to refer to as the Glenn Zone.

Felix bristled and frowned at him. “What are you talking about?”

Sylvain was already this deep in, so he took a swig of his own beer and plowed through. “The song. It was about Glenn and it was good, don’t me wrong, it just was a bit much for them. Might’ve given a heads up?”

Felix stared at him. Sylvain couldn’t really tell what he was thinking, which wasn’t good since he was usually a pro at reading Felix. Then Felix scoffed and looked away. “Broken Sword isn’t about Glenn.”

“It seemed like it was,” Sylvain said. Glaringly obviously so.

Felix’s voice was so quiet Sylvain almost didn’t hear him. “It’s about me.”

A few of the lyrics came back to Sylvain in a crash and he let out a low whistle. “Shit, are you okay?”

“Yeah, I wrote it ages ago,” Felix said, still tense. “It’s vague on purpose, but neither of them should have—” He scoffed again. “Whatever. It’s typical.”

Sylvain mulled over the song in his mind again, trying to put it in this new frame of context. “Was it about you and Glenn?”

Felix paused, his frown shifting between confusion and annoyance. “Maybe. Like I said, I wrote it forever ago. If I had more time I would’ve switched the verses, it’s the melody that matters for Annette to perform it.”

“It’s _good_ ,” Sylvain said, because he was worried that part of it flew past the rest of it. And judging by Felix’s skeptical look, he was right. “Felix, you were fucking amazing. That song especially. I guess Replacement Redhead is a good singer, but come on, you know that was all you.”

“Shut up,” Felix said, looking away from him, the faint flush almost reached his ears.

“I’m glad you didn’t quit music like you threatened to,” Sylvain said.

“Thank Annette,” Felix said, because he was an asshole.

“Brutality doesn’t suit you, Fe,” Sylvain whined.

Felix barely hid his smirk with another sip of his drink.

Then the love of Sylvain’s life strolled through the doors and onto the balcony and headed straight towards them. Sylvain kept himself relaxed and loose as the long haired leggy brunette came towards them. “Hey,” Sylvain said.

“No,” she said, for some unknown reason. Then looked at him and scoffed. Uh oh. “I know who you are and quit while you’re ahead.”

Sylvain blinked and tried to recover enough to think of a new tactic, because a challenge sounded fun and she had _really_ nice legs, but then she moved her attention to Felix.

“Felix.”

“Dorothea,” Felix said, blandly with an eyebrow raised.

“He’s gay,” Sylvain pointed out.

“Yes, I know that,” Dorothea, lovely Dorothea said, with a strong hint of exasperation in her voice already. She was annoyed by his presence, Sylvain was addicted. “He dated my roommate in college.”

“Yuri?” Sylvain asked.

Felix whipped his head around. “How the hell do you know that?”

Sylvain shrugged. “You dated literally one dude since Dimitri, not counting that drunken one-night stand you had with Mercedes’ tall blond built brother.” Felix looked apoplectic. Sylvain grinned and shrugged again. “Mercie and I made friends.”

“Mercedes,” Sylvain pointed out to Dorothea while Felix processed that and gripped his beer bottle like he was considering throwing it at Sylvain. “A woman friend of mine. I have multiple of them. I’m not whatever hound dog reputation you think you’ve heard.”

Dorothea put a hand on her hip. “You’re the asshole who keeps trying to steal Bernie, but I would’ve guessed the fuckboy thing by looking at you.”

“Oh!” Sylvain laughed. Bernadetta Varley was an insanely talented song producer that Sylvain had gotten to brutally chop up his first attempt at a composition and help him make into an actual song. He’d been trying to get her to unofficially join the band for months. “Come on! You can’t hog her. She’s so good. She makes my lyrics into actual songs and not something a muppet wrote while drunk.”

Dorothea humphed and then turned back to Felix. “You’re friends with Ingrid right?”

“I’m friends with Ingrid,” Sylvain said. “See, multiple friends who are women.”

“I will get a gag,” Dorothea threatened.

Sylvain lifted his eyebrows. “I would be amenable to that, but we’ll need a safeword.”

“Yes,” Felix said, a little forcefully, “I’m friends with Ingrid. Why?”

Dorothea had a very pretty smile. It curved around pretty lips. “What’s her deal?”

“You have to be more specific,” Felix said.

Dorothea’s smile slipped slightly, but she seemed used to dealing with Felix, so it didn’t trip her up. “I know she’s single, but is she the dip in the pool type or take a swim type?”

Dorothea was interested in Ingrid. That was… well he didn’t want to be this much of a stereotypical dude, but that was hot… unless it meant Dorothea _really_ wouldn’t be into him, which was a shame.

“Ingrid’s straight,” Sylvain said, with a snort. “Sorry, babe.”

Felix was giving him a weird look, but turned to Dorothea. “Ingrid will tell you what she is if you ask.”

Dorothea seemed to mull that over, completely and almost masterfully ignoring Sylvain. “Put in a good word?”

“Sure,” Felix said, it seemed mostly to get her away. She kissed him on the cheek and sauntered off giving Sylvain an expansive view of the fact that those great legs met up with a very nice ass.

“Think Dorothea would be interested in me if I scooped up the remnants of her broken heart once she gets rejected by Ingrid?” Sylvain asked, but Felix was giving him that weird look again. “What?”

“How do you know my dating history but you don’t know Ingrid’s?” he asked.

“I tired of hearing about the boring guys she dates,” Sylvain said. It always rubbed him the wrong way. She kept picking melba toast after melba toast to go out with. Ingrid needed someone to occasionally loosen her up, not keep her so responsible all the time.

“Ingrid doesn’t only date men,” Felix said.

Sylvain snorted. “Right.” When Felix still looked like he was serious, Sylvain straightened up on the iron railing. “No she doesn’t. If she got rowdy during a party and made out with a chick, that’s… well I would be heartbroken she didn’t give me the details—but I’d _know_ if she dated women.”

“She dated Leonie for almost a year,” Felix said.

“Hilda’s _drummer_?” Sylvain balked at him, but Felix still hadn’t pulled a face like he was telling a joke. “No. She didn’t…why didn’t she tell me?”

Felix’s response was drowned out by Sylvain checking his view of the party again. He spotted Ingrid chatting with Dorothea, who had gotten her a drink. She looked bashful and was maybe even flirting. Since when did Ingrid even know how to flirt? She should’ve been in a cardigan knitted by her sweet old granny and stuck at home with an old historical novel being boring. Not learning how to flirt. His stomach felt a little like lead. Why wouldn’t she have told him this?

And why would she date Dorothea? She didn’t even know Dorothea. And _Leonie_?

“Leonie?” he asked Felix, who’d apparently been in the middle of saying something, but Sylvain didn’t care. “I can’t believe this. Why didn’t— This is fucking stupid!”

Sylvain continued his tirade between drinking more beer and watching Dorothea _seduce_ Ingrid. He was flooded by the complete irritation of being kept out of the loop. It wouldn’t stop bothering him. So what if Ingrid didn’t tell him? So what if she dated beautiful Dorothea with her long legs? That wasn’t an issue. It was that she didn’t tell him. Right?

“Why is this bothering me so much?” Sylvain finally said, rubbing the edge of his beer bottle against his temple.

Felix let out an incredibly irritated noise. “You are the biggest fool in—it’s because you’re in love with Ingrid.”

Sylvain blinked and then turned from the party to stare at his best friend who had to be drunk. “ _What_?”

Felix didn’t even have to do anything else. He stared at Sylvain and it felt like something shifted in his brain that made the gears finally start working again. “Oh my fucking Goddess.”

“Yeah,” Felix said, and finished off his beer.

“Why—how did you know?” Sylvain asked. “Does anyone else know?”

“Everyone knows,” Felix said.

“Even Ingrid?” Sylvain asked.

“Probably,” Felix said.

“How does she know? How does everyone know? _I_ didn’t even know until five seconds ago.” He grabbed Felix by the shoulders. “Why did you tell me this?”

Or why hadn’t he told him sooner?

“I was hoping you’d figure it out and deal with your shit,” Felix said. He patted Sylvain’s hands calmly, too calmly. He should’ve been freaking out as much as Sylvain was right now.

“Does Ingrid… feel the same way?” Sylvain asked, hands still on Felix’s shoulders.

Felix gently took one hand off at a time until they uselessly hung at Sylvain’s sides. “I have no idea.”

“You’ve nuked my life,” Sylvain said. “You know that, right?”

Felix gave him a patronizing pat on the arm.

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

“Uh,” Ignatz trailed off, as Lysithea von Ordelia, of Bappy Too, kept getting too close to the camera. “I’m the outside observer, you should really talk to Flayn. See I’m supposed to be outside of it. On the outside.”

“Are you?” Lysithea asked. She was very determined to see behind his screen. “Or are you creating a false narrative based on whoever wins here? I haven’t seen your credentials and your social media is painfully under managed.”

Ignatz fumbled with the screen again.

—-

“Are you implying something about my age?” Lysithea asked, or more accurate yelled at Raphael, still holding his tray of food. “I’ll have you know I’m as competent as any of the other competitors. Perhaps more so, because I dedicate myself to the craft.”

“I didn’t mean anything by it!” Raphael said. “I only meant, because you’re short.”

“Agh!”

—-

Lysithea was sitting on the bottom of the stairs leading up to the mezzanine. Her bandmate, Cyril was comforting her. Ignatz tried to get close enough to pick up some sound.

“I’m only saying, maybe if you tried letting them insult you before blowing up at them?”

Lysithea sighed. “I overheard Forgotten Hero saying we only made it through out of _pity_.”

Cyril frowned. “Then I guess we’ll have to kick their asses.”

Lysithea smiled, shyly and accepted the piece of cake that Cyril was offering. Then she flicked her eyes up and noticed Ignatz.

“Are you taping me again without my express permission?”

“N-no?”

—-

“Claude von Riegan!” Lysithea screamed across the empty stage. “I don’t care if you’re Cyril’s cousin, I will end you!”

“Gotta catch me first, princess!”

—-

Ignatz sighed looking over the feed. He looked at Flayn. “I don’t think any of this is useable.”

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

Sylvain was always high energy before a performance, but Dimitri didn’t recall him being this bad. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?” Sylvain said and crossed his arms over his chest. Then he crossed them other way. Then he let out a grunt of annoyance, raked a hand through his hair and walked to the side of the stage.

Dimitri glanced at Dedue. “It isn’t only me?”

Dedue shook his head. “He’s been that way all morning.”

Dimitri hadn’t slept well so that may have been why he hadn’t noticed. The timing was particularly terrible since they were up next, but Sylvain had performed under worse circumstances before and always managed to pull through.

Dimitri walked to where Sylvain was standing. He appeared to be peering around the corner to the crowd. When Dimitri caught his direction, he saw Ingrid set up the same place where they’d watched Felix’s band perform. Felix was next to her, as were his bandmates. The one Dimitri couldn’t remember the name of because Sylvian refused to call her anything but Replacement Redhead said something that made Felix smile.

Dimitri forced himself back and patted Sylvain’s arm. Short of Heaven was in the middle of their set and they would be up to play soon after. Dimitri’s normal nerves were amplified and Sylvain’s energy levels were not helping.

“Did you know Ingrid dated girls?” Sylvain asked, as Dimitri gave a cursory look over his clothes. Before Dimitri could answer, he shook his head. “Doesn’t matter.”

“Does that bother you?” Dedue asked.

“No, of course not, _why would it bother me_?” Sylvain asked and then walked across the edge of the backstage and started hopping back and forth as if it would burn off his manic energy.

Dimitri watched him for a moment, wondering if it helped. “And I thought I was the crazy one.”

Dedue chuckled. “You seem better today. Less nerves?”

“Less than Sylvain,” Dimitri said.

The crowd burst into applause and a few well placed yells as Short of Heaven finished. Dimitri steeled himself and took a few calming breaths as they changed out the set for their performance.

Sylvain—at the very last moment possible—came up to them, swinging his bass casually around by its strap. “Let’s kill it.”

Dimitri and Dedue placated him with a shared fist bump before they started their own performance. Dimitri had learned long ago to not actively check the crowd and make eye contact when he was performing. It was much easier to focus on the act of performing itself and how the songs flowed. Occasionally he would use the stage lights to blind himself so he couldn’t see an audience at all.

He very nearly managed to go the entire set without his gaze trailing in Felix’s direction. Thankfully his slip was small and the eye contact did not occur. It did cause a slight stumble during Eat the Weeds, which he regretted.

In the end they finished well and managed to inch past into the next round.

Ingrid, Felix, and his bandmates met them backstage. The band thankfully introduced to themselves so Dimitri didn’t have to rely on Sylvain’s terrible epithets.

“Guess, we’re playing each other tomorrow,” Felix said, hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans and staring off in no particular direction that would indicate which of them he was speaking to.

“We’re gonna kick your ass!” Annette said, but that was very obviously directed to Sylvain and potentially not serious as she giggled immediately afterwards.

“Not if you want to jump ship, swee— _ow_ —fuck, Felix!” Sylvain rubbed his shin, glaring at Felix who looked as stone faced as he had yesterday when Hilda was addressing him about her interest in Marianne. “Now, I’m not going to invite you to lunch… well closer to dinner now I guess. Linner? Dunch?”

“Raincheck,” Ingrid said. “I promised Dorothea I’d watch their set.”

“Great!” Sylvain said, a little too enthusiastically. “Felix? Felix’s nonsexual entity bandmates?”

Annette gave an apologetic smile. “Sorry, Mercie and I were going to a bake with booze class. And Mari’s going to watch Hilda play, right?” Annette said, the last part exceedingly cheerfully, causing her shy drummer to mumble something and hide herself in her bangs.

“I’ll pass,” Felix said, and his eyes barely flicked towards Dimitri. “I want to work on our set for tomorrow.”

“Which is why I want to get you drunk,” Sylvain said. “What about the party tonight?”

“One night of Hilda’s parties is enough for me, thanks,” Felix said. He cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck before making what seemed like a concentrated effort to look at both Dimitri and Dedue. “You guys were really good. Good luck tomorrow.”

“But not too much right?” Sylvain asked.

“You’ll need as much as you can get,” Mercedes said, so sweetly it was difficult to tell if she was being genuine or not.

Dimitri was sure there was more awkward banter between Sylvain and Felix’s female bandmates, but things became less interesting to focus on once he realized Felix was very clearly avoiding him. They said their uncomfortable goodbyes and the rest of the evening went much like the day before. Dimitri attempted, but he also couldn’t find much enjoyment in a second night of the party. There were too many people. He made his apologies and left for the sanctuary of the hotel.

Dedue had stayed at the party, so Dimitri had the room to himself. He had nothing particularly exciting in mind, so decided to get ready for bed earlier than normal and perhaps watch one of the many home renovation programs that always seemed to play on hotel TVs.

Towards the end of a couple arguing about tile over restored hardwood there was a knock on his room door. He opened it to see a girl, no more than fourteen or so asking for help finding her brother.

It took Dimitri and Fleche approximately twenty minutes to locate her brother Randolph who had apparently been looking for her as well. They had apparently gotten the floor numbers and room numbers switched, which was where the confusion lay. Dimitri bid them well and went back to his room.

And then realized his key wasn’t in his pocket. He sighed and rested his forehead on the door, remembering he’d also left his cellphone in the room. After an unsurprisingly failed attempt at rousing Sylvain from his room (where he was either occupied, or even more likely not there), Dimitri decided to sit in the hallway and wait for Dedue.

He must have dosed off at some point, because he woke to a boot nudging him in the side. “Don’t you have a room for that?” Felix asked.

Dimitri cleared his throat and tried to stand up far too quickly, almost knocking Felix to the side as he did so. “I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

“It’s fine,” Felix said. He appeared more concerned than angry, which for some reason bothered Dimitri more. “Why are you sleeping in the hall?”

Dimitri sighed and drowned his immediate defensive reaction as to what must have been Felix’s assumption. “I’ve been locked out of my room and Dedue hasn’t returned yet.”

“Oh,” Felix said, his brow furrowed and then he pulled out his cellphone. “Do you know his number?”

Dimitri shook his head, feeling foolish, although he didn’t know many people who memorized phone numbers.

Felix nodded and called, ‘My Best Friend Who I Will Never Replace With a Shorter Model’. After a few rings, it went to voicemail and Sylvain’s message echoed off Felix’s old generation Crest phone. “Hey, when you get this, text me Dedue’s phone number or tell him to get back to the hotel, his boyfriend’s locked out. And stop changing my fucking contact names.”

Felix hung up with an annoyed scoff and started digging around on his phone menu to change Sylvain’s name to what appeared to be ‘Micro-Penis’ before he shoved his phone back in his pocket. “You can hang out in my room until he gets back if you want.”

“Are you sure?” Dimitri asked. “I don’t want to be an imposition.”

Felix rolled his eyes and turned around. “Don’t be an idiot, I’m not going to leave you in the fucking hallway. Come on.”

Felix’s room was on the same floor, but it was much farther down the hallway. It was surprising they hadn’t run into each other already. “Felix?” Dimitri asked as Felix unlocked his door with the keycard he had managed to keep track of and not somehow leave inside the room.

“Mm?” Felix asked, opening the door and kicking off his shoes, throwing them haphazardly into the corner. At least some things hadn’t changed.

“Dedue and I aren’t dating.”

Felix stopped suddenly. Then he started picking up a few stray papers and his laptop from a chair, piling it onto the bed instead. “I thought you guys lived together?” he asked, still focused on organizing his things and clearing space.

“Yes, we’re roommates.” It wasn’t the first time someone had made that assumption, but Dimitri wasn’t sure if it meant something that Felix had. Dimitri sat in the chair Felix cleared and took a chance on an actual attempt at conversation. “We met in grief counseling a few years ago.”

There was far too long a pause for Dimitri to be comfortable, but then Felix turned and tapped his fingers on his leg. His face was twisted into an awkward expression. “I feel like saying ‘that’s great’ is a weird thing to say to that.”

Dimitri snorted, relieved at the normalcy. “He also lost his parents around the same time,” Dimitri said. He had made it an automatic habit to gage reactions to speaking on more serious topics, as most people were immediately uncomfortable, but he couldn’t really read Felix’s expression.

Felix moved his laptop aside and sat on the bed. “Did that help?” he asked.

“Among other things,” Dimitri said. He realized Felix wasn’t avoiding eye contact and felt suddenly lighter. “You were amazing yesterday. The band you’ve put together has a truly unique sound.”

“It’s mostly Annette,” Felix said, brushing off the praise. He looked away from Dimitri again, staring up at the ceiling. Felix’s mouth twisted for a moment and Dimitri thought he might say something, but then he sighed and leaned back on the bed, lifted by his arms. “You guys sounded good today.”

Dimitri wondered what he was going to say instead, but rubbed the back of his neck and shrugged. “We are… it’s fine, Dedue is extremely talented at sound mixing, but I’m convinced Sylvain cheated to get us in this competition based on some of the other bands I’ve heard so far.”

“Don’t do that,” Felix said.

When Dimitri glanced back at him he was frowning. “Do what?”

“Act like you’re not actually good,” Felix said. “It’s fucking annoying. You’re even better than you were when we were — when we had the band.”

Dimitri frowned as well. “You deflected my compliment literally half a minute ago.”

“That’s… that’s not the same thing,” Felix said. “Annie put the band together is what I meant. I know I’m good at writing songs.”

“Your bandmates seem to also enjoy your company,” Dimitri countered. He couldn’t bring himself to describe the extent of how ‘good’ was an unfittingly poor word to describe Felix’s talents in composing songs, not to mention the fact that he had a beautiful voice, even if the last time he sang was likely—

Felix’s phone dinged with a rooster crowing drawing Dimitri out of his thoughts. Felix frowned at whatever the message was. “What the fuck does ‘check Indechgram’ mean?” He frowned harder at his phone and after a moment looked up at Dimitri, “Can you find Sylvain’s Indechgram? I can’t see anything on my feed.”

Dimitri stood up and moved to the bed next to Felix, the laptop and pile of papers between them. He accepted Felix’s phone and felt oddly perverse having access to the inside of his locked account that he’d stared at on more than one occasion. Now that he was finally viewing it, he realized his morose mood was unnecessary. “Felix, you have three pictures.”

“Considering Sylvain memorized my password, good,” Felix said, as if he didn’t know what was going in his own social media account.

Dimitri glanced at him sideways for a moment. “When was the last time you used this?”

Felix shrugged. “I don’t know, when did I post the last picture?”

Dimitri looked at it. It was a picture of Annette grinning widely, her arm hooked to another person he didn’t recognize. “Three years ago.”

“There’s your answer,” Felix said, “Can you please find out what the hell Sylvain is talking about?”

Dimitri blinked for a moment and went to Sylvain’s account. There were at least a dozen more photos since Dimitri had checked this morning, mostly of Hilda’s party. One of them in particular explained the mystery of Sylvain’s message. Dimitri handed the phone back to Felix. There was a picture of Dedue fast asleep on one of the couches, a comically small knitted blanket over him, while Hilda posed with a false bunny ears behind him.

“Is the concierge still open?” Felix asked.

Dimitri shook his head. He mulled over his options. He could talk to the front desk, there was always at least one person on staff and potentially they remembered him or had some sort of record that could verify his identity and get him back in his room.

Then Felix let out a deep sigh and picked the pile of things and his laptop off the bed and put it on the chair again. “Whatever. It’s a king.”

Dimitri blinked for a moment and then stared at Felix. “You’re… Felix I couldn’t…”

“You’re not _sleeping_ in the hallway,” Felix said. “It’s—just don’t be weird.” He pulled the decorative pillows off the top of the bed and threw them onto the middle. “There. Okay?”

Dimitri was still staring at him, which apparently made Felix uncomfortable enough to walk out of the main room and go into the bathroom. “I’m taking a shower,” he said before he slammed the door shut, leaving Dimitri still staring after him.

Moments later the door opened again, Felix stomped through the room, dragged a t-shirt and pajama pants out of his suitcase and then went back into the bathroom. Since the door was closed, Dimitri didn’t resist the impulse to smile.

He turned the television to the same channel as he’d been watching before. A pair of newlyweds were arguing about the importance of wainscoting. By the time they’d chosen their house, Felix came out of the bathroom. His hair was wrapped in a towel and the bottoms he wore seemed to be too long for him, as they kept catching on his heels. They were also fairly low on his hips, which Dimitri noticed when Felix came closer—in the direction of the chair piled with things, picking them up before settling on the chair and laying them all haphazardly across his lap.

“Did you want me to turn this off?” Dimitri asked, gesturing to the television with the remote.

Felix shook his head, putting one earbud in at a time as he opened his laptop. “I’m just going to work, watch whatever you want or go to sleep even.”

Dimitri tried to focus on the program, a new couple with far too many children were insistent on uprooting their life to move to Dagda, so it seemed reasonably interesting. However, he couldn't help draw his gaze to Felix.

Felix was so intently focused on whatever he was doing on his laptop he didn’t notice Dimitri staring. His brow was furrowed and his lower lip was being worried between his teeth. His fingers moved quickly over the keys and Dimitri found himself watching Felix do his work for the span of the episode. Once he heard the new one start, he realized he should stop. It wasn’t fair to drag old emotions and history to the present. Felix had clearly moved on and carved a new life for himself and Dimitri was doing the same.

He sighed and with that thought turned the program off. He got properly into the bed and made an attempt at sleep.

Dimitri’s eyes were closed—though no sleep had come—as he heard Felix’s feet padding around the bed, switching lights off and then felt the comforter move between them as he slipped in next to him. Dimitri hated the pillows, but understood their purpose. Besides even without them it wasn’t as if he’d be able to see in the dark and know if Felix had unwound his hair from the towel. He knew it was shorter, but didn’t know what it looked like down.

After a while, he heard Felix’s voice. “You’re not asleep are you?”

Dimitri huffed a laugh. “No. I’ve… been trying.” He turned more fully onto his back so he could stare at what he could see in the dark of the ceiling. “Were you working on your set or new lyrics?”

“Mostly the set,” Felix said. Then, with a quiet breath he said, “Broken Sword isn’t about Glenn. Or it wasn’t supposed to be anyway. I guess stuff got mixed in there when I wrote it.”

Dimitri couldn’t think of a response so made a vague noise of affirmation.

“Sylvain said you left,” Felix said. “During the set. I didn’t… I didn’t mean to um… trigger you or anything.”

Dimitri wished he could see Felix’s face. It was difficult to understand what his intentions were. There was so much pity tied up in his concern sometimes. “You didn’t. I… admit it took me by surprise, but that was all.”

He hadn’t thought Felix would have wanted to write anything about Glenn. Frankly, Dimitri was surprised he’d kept writing at all considering how he’d turned away from anything to do with music after the accident. “Annette has a very emotive voice,” Dimitri added. “It worked well for the tone switch.”

“Yeah,” Felix said.

Dimitri could hear the pitch of his breathing. The bed was large enough for both of them and their barrier of pillows, but it was still such a close proximity.

“How did you two meet?” Dimitri asked, thinking of nothing better to say.

Felix’s responding snort was fond. “She was being loud in the library singing along to a song she’d made up, it was incredibly weird and funny. I startled her so bad when I tried to tell her that she almost passed out. So I ended up buying her coffee and… I guess that was that.”

Dimitri knew the uncomfortable feeling he was having was jealousy, but he couldn’t tell if it was for Felix’s closeness with Annette or the fact that he’d been so far away from Dimitri that all of this was new information.

“You said she picked your bandmates?”

“Mm,” Felix hummed, “she’d done some fine arts camp for kids with Mercie and Marianne was always hiding in the back of her music theory classes.”

“I’m glad you didn’t quit music,” Dimitri said, before he could stop himself.

There was an awkward silence in the room, Felix’s breathing still audible, but no other response. Before Dimitri could think of something to counter his impulse, Felix said, “Thanks. You’re happy with Sylvain and Dedue and performing, right?”

“Yes,” Dimitri said.

“Then, I’m glad you didn’t quit either,” Felix said, then in a rushed breath added, “and I’m glad you’re doing better.”

Dimitri could think of a million things to say, but none of them he had any right to anymore. “I suppose I am too.” He turned away from Felix, although he rarely had luck getting to sleep on his side. “We should attempt to rest before tomorrow. Heated battle after all.”

“Yeah,” Felix said. “Night then.”

“Goodnight, Felix.”

♪

Ingrid leaned against the wall while Sylvain continued to spy through the peephole of his hotel door. At least he was giving her a running commentary. “Hook, line, and sinker, baby.”

“Really?” Ingrid asked. “A fishing metaphor?”

Sylvain shrugged, giving the peephole one last look before turning to Ingrid. “I don’t know, I’m just happy it worked.”

Ingrid felt a little guilty. “Isn’t it kind of manipulative to set our friends up like this?”

Sylvain groaned. “Come on, don’t back out in me now! This was your idea!”

“I just said we should lock them in a room together to talk, Sylvain. It’s an expression!” She didn’t know he was going to _hire_ people to lure Dimitri out of his room in an elaborate scheme to get Felix to invite him back to his own. It was good they were going to talk, but honestly.

“I can’t believe I let you talk me into helping with this.”

Sylvain’s grin was unbearably charming. “What if I ordered room service?”

“Mm,” Ingrid said, noncommittal, but obviously cracked when she made her way over to sit on the bed.

Sylvain’s grin was worse than charming as he pulled out his phone and ordered hotel service off the app. Ingrid couldn’t see what he ordered, but it better have been good. Then he hopped onto the bed, knocking her over a bit and sprawled out with another stupid grin.

Ingrid knocked him in the chest with her fist and he laughed. “Ah, I love nothing more than wasting my father’s money.”

Ingrid tried not to cringe, but she must have, because Sylvain sat up a little. “Hey, what’s up? You suddenly a Gautier Senior defender?”

“Never that,” Ingrid said, solemnly. She supposed they had to talk about this eventually. “… sometimes it’s difficult to hear you talk so casually about money. Not everyone has an unlimited trust fund.”

Sylvain scoffed, not taking her seriously. “And yet you’ll eat the chicken wings I ordered.”

Ingrid frowned. “I’m serious. I know it’s never been a factor for you, but you spent what would be two month’s rent for me on those actors. It’s… I’m not mad you have money, I just wish you’d be a bit more appreciative.”

“Sorry,” Sylvain said. He rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s not like it doesn’t come with strings, Ingrid. Why do you think I have a business degree?”

“Which you use to manage a rockband,” Ingrid pointed out.

He shrugged his shoulders. “All about those connections, baby.”

Ingrid rolled her eyes. “Maybe I should go.”

“No, no, no!” Sylvain jumped up to his knees on the bed, shifting it beneath them and held his hands out. “The food will be here soon and please? We never get to hang out anymore. You’re always with your replacement boys.”

Ingrid couldn’t help but smile fondly at him. She patted his cheek. “They’re not replacements.”

Sylvain was very openly sulking now. “Then how come you didn’t want to join The Silver Maiden?”

“Because I have a life and obligations,” Ingrid said. “And… I’m glad you are serious about it, but I wasn’t sure when you told me. It kind of seemed like one of your schemes to piss your father off.”

“That’s a side benefit,” Sylvain said. He looked like he might say something else but then the food arrived. An array of chicken wings, sandwiches, chili cheese fries, and assorted cakes were spread out over Sylvain’s bed like a feast soon after.

“I should probably text Felix,” Sylvain said, licking a piece of frosting off his finger and pulling out his phone. Once he was done he set it down on the nightstand, face down.

Ingrid felt a little pleased he wasn’t keeping it up so he could see if any of his latest girls texted him. It was nice to get his undivided attention. She went for another chicken wing. “How did you get Dedue to agree to this?”

She hadn’t known Dedue very long, but he seemed too serious to fall into Sylvain’s traps. Then again, she could’ve said the same thing about herself.

“Didn’t,” Sylvain said, grabbing a fry. “I asked Hilda for a favor.”

“Do I want to know?” Ingrid asked, licking the side of her lip where some of the messier sauce had dripped.

Sylvain was staring at her. She must’ve been very messy. Well it wasn’t like he wasn’t used to it. He shook his head. “Uh, no. It’s not anything weird. He’ll just crash at the penthouse tonight so Dimitri and Felix have to deal with each other all night.”

Ingrid stared down at the food and felt guilty again. “Maybe we should call this off. It doesn’t feel right.”

“It’ll work!” Sylvain said. “They’re both still nuts—okay bad phrasing—they’re both still thinking about each other constantly and want to be at least friends if not… you know, bang their way back into the band.”

“You’re disgusting,” Ingrid said. She sucked the meat off her wing. Sylvain was looking at her again. “What?”

“Nothing,” Sylvain said. The left side of his mouth lifted. “It's weirdly soothing watching you shovel it in.”

Ingrid stuck her leg out to kick him around the food although it was more of a nudge with her sock than anything. “Aren’t you worried about being able to play tomorrow?”

“Pfft,” Sylvain brushed it off like he did most things. “I’ll be fine and Dima and Dedue are professionals. We will mop the floor with Felix’s stupid band.”

When Ingrid raised an eyebrow at him, his shoulders and head sank dejectedly as he corrected himself. “We will give them a good run for their money at least. Have I mentioned how much I hate how good they are?”

“A few times,” Ingrid said, taking another wing.

“So uh… I feel like we don’t talk about you,” Sylvain said, out of nowhere. “And banging. I mean dating. I feel like we never talk about that stuff.”

“Did you want to?” Ingrid asked. He’d never seemed particularly interested before.

“Maybe,” Sylvain said. Then he frowned and settled back into a different, even more awkward sitting position. “How come you didn’t tell me you were dating Leonie… for a year. That’s a big deal, Ingrid. Plus I didn’t even know you liked girls.”

It wasn’t like Ingrid had been keeping it a secret. Sylvain lived far away and when they did connect it wasn’t like she wanted to hear about _his_ stream of conquests. “Does it bother you that I am?”

“Of course not!” Sylvain said, a little too forcefully. “My best friends are gay. I think. I don’t think Dimitri has really dated anyone but Felix, so who knows.”

Ingrid tossed another bone into the pile and went for the fries this time. “I’m ignoring the ‘I’m not homophobic because my friend is gay’ statement.”

Sylvain stole the fry she was aiming for out of spite. “So what, you’re bi? Pan?”

Ingrid never knew how to respond to these questions and it seemed strange to be talking to Sylvain of all people about it. “Sure,” she said, then sighed. “I don’t know. I hate when people say this because they sound incredibly well… douchey, but I suppose I like the individual person. I’m not really interested in putting a label on it for the most part.”

Sylvain stared at her and then flopped backwards on the bed, almost knocking the fries into the coverlet. “I feel like I don’t know you anymore. You dated someone for a year and never said anything.”

“You never really seem interested when I bring up my dating life, Sylvain,” Ingrid pointed out.

“I could… try,” Sylvain said. “I’m not only a rich boy fuck up, I’m responsible. Sometimes.”

She laughed at him, unable to help herself and grabbed the last wing. “You’re incorrigible is what you are.”

He turned sideways and rested his cheek on his fist. “Ingrid…”

“Mm?” she asked, finishing off the last wing.

Sylvain stared at her again and then smiled and picked up a napkin, wiping it across the side of her face. “You’re a very graceful eater, you know that.”

He said it so… _fondly_. Ingrid had to look away from him or she might do something ridiculous like blush. “Sylvain…”

“You want to watch a movie?” Sylvain asked, seemingly out of nowhere. “You don’t have to stay too late, but we need to make sure Dimitri doesn’t sneak out and sleep in the hallway and the Elite channel is playing an adaptation of Loog and the Maiden Wind.”

She loved that film. And that book. It was too tempting to resist. He seemed to know it as his smile deepened when she turned around and made herself more comfortable. “Fine, but I’m not falling for your sabotage. We have to play the Ashen Wolves tomorrow so I need an actual night’s sleep in my own room.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Sylvain said, and hopped up to sitting on the bed. He grabbed the remote and tuned the channel before grabbing the box of cannolis and setting it between them. He must have spent a fortune on room service.

Ingrid bit into her cannoli instead of saying anything about it and Sylvain let out a pleased hum as he settled back against the headboard.

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

“Um.” Marianne von Edmund, drummer for the Swamp Beasties, seemed to respond to Flayn by trying to disappear behind Mercedes von Martiz, keyboardist and backup singer.

“I am sorry if that question offended you,” Flayn said.

“Oh no,” Marianne said, still hiding behind Mercedes. “Only, I… uh, it feels a little embarrassing to talk about, especially in front of cameras.”

Annette Dominic, lead singer, clapped her hands. “It’s super normal, Mari.” She smiled brightly at Flayn. “The amount of cross-band dating is _wild_.”

“It is a lot of attractive people, with similar interests, in the same place,” Mercedes said, nodding softly, in agreement.

“Right?” Annette giggled. “It’s so normal to find someone you like around here.”

“And it doesn’t affect your playing?” Flayn asked.

Annette beamed at her. “Of course not! We’re all here to have fun anyway.”

“Speak for yourself,” said Felix Fraldarius, with a dry snort.

“Sorry, _we’re_ here to win, Felix is here to be a competitive asshole,” Annette said, just as cheerily as her last statement.

“Exactly,” Felix said, causing his other bandmates, including Marianne to laugh.

“Have you had any intra-band relationships?” Flayn asked. “You and Felix have had a buzz around the circuit.”

Annette’s responding snort was extremely loud. “No.”

“Dating bandmates gets messy,” Felix said, with a disinterested shrug. “Do whatever you want with other bands, but once it gets personal in the band, it means things can fall apart.”

“Sounds like you know from experience,” Flayn said.

“Yes,” Felix said, with a complete deadpan expression and flat voice. “Annette and I had a torrid passionate love affair that almost tore us apart.”

Annette broke out into giggling so forcefully that she almost toppled over. She snorted and wheezed so hard, that Mercedes and even Marianne started laughing too. Felix crossed his arms over his chest and smiled, which from Ignatz’s observations seemed to be his version of riotous laughter.

Flayn narrowed her eyes at him and then gave Ignatz a look that meant they’d talk about it in reel review later. “I see.”

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

Felix woke up with his cheek smashed into Dimitri’s chest. If that wasn’t bad enough, his arm was slung across Dimitri’s waist and his leg had somehow thrown itself over to rest between Dimitri’s. Dimitri’s own arm was curled around him and his hand was resting on Felix’s hip. There was skin touching skin where his pajama bottoms were slipping.

How the fuck had this happened? Felix looked for the pillow barrier that was supposed to prevent five years worth of repressed feelings from rearing their ugly heads, but the decorative pillows were scattered on the floor and in the corner of the bed, as if one of them had kicked or thrown them off in their sleep.

Not one of them. Felix. Obviously from the fucking way he was draped over Dimitri, he’d been the one to make it nocturnally awkward.

There were two very immediate impulses, one was to jump up and pray that Dimitri didn’t notice when he fled to the bathroom. The other was to keep his head down and try to go back to sleep, leaving this as Dimitri’s problem. And also letting Felix enjoy how—

 _No_.

Felix breathed carefully, keeping an eye to make sure Dimitri was still fast asleep. He moved his leg first, lifting it up into the air and then angling it downwards so it was resting on its pair instead of Dimitri’s. Then he lifted his arm off the soft fabric of Dimitri’s shirt (and everything underneath it). Felix brought his hand to Dimitri’s which was resting on his hip and tried lifting it, but then Dimitri snorted in his sleep and Felix dropped it.

That seemed to wake Dimitri, because he started opening his eyes and Felix in a panic went back to Plan A and tried rolling off him and off the bed. This did nothing to free Felix—all it did was land him on his back and tug on Dimitri’s arm, making Dimitri instinctively roll right on top of him.

Dimitri was a heavy and almost uncomfortable weight and so damn warm. His eyes were still the same bright blue and they blinked open blearily, adjusting to the morning from the Valley of Torment. Dimitri was so close—their noses were practically touching. Felix’s every self-preservation instinct was telling him to shove Dimitri off of him and get out of there before everything went to even further to hell.

Then Dimitri’s hand—the one not crushed underneath Felix and pressing softly against his lower back—reached up to move a lock of Felix’s hair from in front of his face, to somewhere behind his ear. It was such a small thing, but it overwhelmed Felix enough to close his eyes against the intimacy of it.

“Felix…” Dimitri said. His voice was deeper and had a husk to it first thing in the morning, which was also new.

Felix shook his head, meaning to say something, but only ended up pressing his cheek into Dimitri’s hand still resting by his face. He was asleep. This was an embarrassing dream that he was having while sleeping next to his…

“Dimitri,” Felix breathed and dared open his eyes to the intense gaze of his former everything.

Dimitri leaned forward, nose brushing against Felix, mouth slightly parted. Felix turned his head again, so that it slotted perfectly when Dimitri’s lips pressed against his own. He fisted his hands into Dimitri’s shirt and groaned at the feeling of being pulled towards Dimitri while still being pressed down.

In the haze of the morning, Felix wondered if this was what kissing Dimitri had always felt like and why he’d ever stopped. Dimitri’s teeth brushed against Felix’s lower lip as he began to kiss Felix’s jaw, carving a line down to his neck. The mix of teeth and pillowed lips on his pulse point caused a horrific sounding whine that almost turned into, _Dima_. Dimitri’s nonsense rumbles against his neck, paired with one hand tangled in Felix hair and the other sliding down the bare skin of his back were almost too much too stand.

He hadn’t dreamed of this. He hadn’t let himself. He hadn’t—

Felix’s fucking phone blared with an off-chord honking shriek followed by cowbells. As if coming out from under a spell, the fog in Dimitri’s eyes cleared and he stared down at Felix in an indecipherable way before bolting backwards and taking his weight off him completely.

Felix felt immediately like he’d lost something, but the blaring noise of the ringtone clearly fucking Sylvain had put on his phone continued so obnoxiously that it made it difficult to think about anything else.

“Um.” Dimitri had the nerve to look that good, with his hair mussed and his lips swollen. Had Felix done that? “Felix, your phone,” Dimitri said.

Felix reached around the other side of the bed to the nightstand and grabbed it. “ _What_?” he snapped into it.

“Good morning to you too, sunshine,” Sylvain’s voice rang out too cheerily. “Wanted to let you know Dedue’s back and I have convinced him to get bagels with schmear if His Highness wants to get back into his room.”

“Right,” Felix said. He flicked his eyes towards Dimitri who was adjusting his shirt and looking away from him like he was ashamed he had his tongue down Felix’s throat a few moments ago. “Thanks,” Felix said, roughly and ignored Sylvain’s response as he hung up. “You—Sylvain said Dedue’s back in your room if you want to… if you needed to… um…”

Fuck. Fuck. _Fuck_.

Felix didn’t know why this happened. He didn’t know why it stopped. And he didn’t know which one of those two things was the thing he wanted to find out more.

“Felix,” Dimitri said, and the husk in his voice had turned too serious. Felix tried not to grip his phone. “I’m… I am sorry, I didn’t—I wasn’t fully awake yet, I think I… either way that’s not an excuse.”

Did he need an excuse? “Excuse?” Felix asked.

Dimitri didn’t even look at him. “I don’t mean to bring up old… I understand that falling back into old habits isn’t the way forward.”

Felix did grip his phone and ignored the way his heart felt like it had shrunken down and folded up against his sternum. “Right,” he said. “Old habits.”

Dimitri rubbed his hands over his face. “I’ve made a mess already. I wanted to _talk_ to you not—”

“Yeah, no, I get it,” Felix said, a little too sharply. He swallowed down whatever emotion was trying to rise up and spun around so he could get off the bed and go hide in the bathroom or something.

“Felix,” Dimitri said and caught his arm. Felix automatically turned around, not realizing the phone was still gripped hard in his hand. A little too hard, because as he pivoted it squeezed out and hit Dimitri directly in his eye.

♫ ♫ ♫

#### Five Years Earlier

##### (well closer to four years technically)

♫ ♫ ♫

No one helped Felix with his bags or getting the door open so he didn’t fucking know why he expected anyone to help him close the door. He kicked it closed with a grunt and resisted the urge to dump everything on the floor when he took off his shoes. He’d have to pick it up again anyway.

His father was on the phone in the living room as he passed on the way to the stairs. Judging by his face and the pacing it was yet another fucking person who had only now found out that Glenn died and felt like having the people mourning him comfort _them_ like they gave a shit.

“No, no, I appreciate that,” his old man was saying. “I didn’t even know Glenn had it on his license, but I’ve been in touch with one of that people that received his liver—”

Felix practically bolted up the stairs so he didn’t have to overhear anymore. The only thing worse than his father’s obsession with finding _reason_ in the fucking car accident that killed Glenn was when he agreed with the backwards fucking pieces of trash that thought “He’s in the arms of the Goddess” or “The Goddess has a Plan” was comforting.

Felix slowed as he got to the top of the stairs. Dimitri was still getting used to his medication and he was … sensitive about Felix’s moods. If Felix went in there angry, Dimitri might think he was angry at him and… well Felix didn’t want to think about what might happen.

It didn’t matter. He could put it behind them now. Move forward.

They’d _finally_ listened when Felix had said something other than grieving was wrong and Dimitri was getting actual help instead of well-wishes and funeral potato casseroles. Saints, he was tired of potatoes.

Dimitri wasn’t in the office that his father had cleaned out to be his bedroom (the old man was now working out of the dining room, while Glenn’s room stayed perfectly preserved like some weird shrine) and he wasn’t in Felix’s either. Felix dropped the bags on the ground anyway and rubbed his shoulders once the weight was off.

He padded down the hallway and saw that the bathroom door was open and the light was on. “Hey,” Felix said. “I got your assignments for this week, but I think Mr. Rangeld—” Felix was never calling him Alois it was weird. “—misses having someone who actually thinks his stupid jokes are funny.”

Felix had always wondered what it felt like to be the idiot in a horror movie that slowly moved towards danger without any concept of what was waiting for them. Now he knew.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Felix asked, even though he could see what the fuck he was doing. Dimitri had half his pill bottle down the drain.

Dimitri was still holding the bottle over the sink, frozen as he stared at Felix. Then he frowned, the dark anger that had surfaced in the last few months rising to his face again and making Felix take an unintentional step back. “I don’t like how they feel. I don’t like how they make me feel.”

“Then tell that to the fucking doctor!” Felix said. So much for not being angry. “Were you going to just _pretend_ to take them? You can’t wish it away, Dimitri!”

“I know that,” Dimitri said, but it was practically a growl. “You don’t understand… they’re… they cloud things up.”

“Good!” Felix said, forcing himself not to flinch when Dimitri shot that harsh glare at him. He’d never glared like that before. It made his face beastly. Be patient everyone said. He lost his entire family and his best friend everyone said. They all ignored it the fact that this wasn’t grief. “You’re hearing voices, Dimitri,” Felix hissed. “You called me—”

“I know,” Dimitri snapped and then turned around. He looked at himself in the mirror and then away from it like the sight disturbed him. That or he saw something else there that wasn’t. Felix wasn’t sure which was worse. “I’m not taking them,” he said.

“Dima—”

“No,” Dimitri said, and then dumped the rest of the bottle into the sink.

Felix snapped. He’d been holding it together for _months_ waiting for his boyfriend to come back and his father to gain a spine, but— “You’re not the only person who lost Glenn!”

Dimitri slammed the bathroom door shut. Practically in his face. Angry tears stung Felix’s eyes, but he hadn’t cried since the funeral and he wasn’t going to start now over this. Fuck this.

He stomped his way downstairs, going for his shoes at the door.

“Felix?” his father called out. “When did you get home?”

Felix tugged his shoes on. “Dimitri hasn’t been taking his pills.”

“Oh,” his old man said, like Felix had told him about a spot on the wall and not his pseudo-new-son’s mental illness. “He did mention the side effects were bothering him. Maybe it’s easier without them.”

“Yeah, because you’re both mental health professionals,” Felix grunted and stood up once his shoes were tied.

“Felix, you’re making this bigger than it is. It’s… Dimitri has been through a lot and if he needs time to process it, then we should give it to him.”

Felix thought back to a few nights ago, right before Dimitri had _finally_ agreed to try the medication. Thought about how he’d been scared _of_ Dimitri instead of scared for him—for the first time in his life. Felix had always wanted to be right next to Dimitri, since they were little and now he wanted to be anywhere else.

“Whatever, live in delusion,” Felix said, and walked out the door.

He paced around the block, trying to decide where he could spend the next hour or so and ended up just walking. He stopped for a bit when he knew he’d need to turn around or go straight into the freeway and sat on someone’s outer wall. Felix took out his phone, not wanting to deal with going back home yet. He tried texting Sylvain, but after no response he started scrolling through his email.

There was one from Enbarr College. Felix had forgotten the guidance councilor had encouraged (aka guilted) him into applying there. It was as far away from Faerghus as someone could get without leaving Fódlan completely.

He’d gotten in.

Felix walked back home in a haze. When he opened the door he smelled funeral potatoes and some kind of meat. He absentmindedly took off his shoes and when he went to the dining room, Dimitri and his father were eating and talking like everything was normal. They both looked at him like none of the last few hours (or months) had happened.

Felix turned back around and went up to his room. He pulled out his laptop, found the email again, and followed the instructions to confirm his enrollment.

♫ ♫ ♫

#### Present Day

♫ ♫ ♫

“Geez, Felix,” Sylvain said. “If you were that nervous about playing against us you could’ve tried a little less violent of a sabotage.” Felix had his head in his hands and didn’t seem to think pirate Dimitri was as funny as Sylvain did. “It’ll be fine!” Sylvain said, “the medic said he’d heal up nicely in about a week or so.”

Felix’s response was a muffled groan.

“What happened?” Sylvain asked. “Like, I mean sometimes Dimitri is annoying, but I’ve never had the urge to throw my phone at him.”

Felix dropped his hands and glared at Sylvain. “It was an accident and _your_ fault, because you called right when—fuck,” he bent over and rested his hands behind his neck like he could physically pull himself forward between his knees. “This is hell. I’m in actual hell.”

Sylvain opened his mouth to reply with a good one, but Mercedes pressed a hand to his arm and shook her head. “I have this, Sylvain,” she said, gentle but firm. “Don’t you have a performance to get ready for?”

“I would have been in love with you if you were my second grade teacher,” Sylvain said.

Mercedes ignored him and settled down next to Felix on the bench, rubbing a hand on his back and saying something comforting in her wispy dulcet voice.

Sylvain sighed and dragged his feet back to his pirate king. “You know it’s not a bad look.”

Dimitri’s baleful looks weren’t as effective when he only had one eye to use for them. “It certainly won’t help with my migraines.”

“Don’t have one now.”

“Thank you, Sylvain,” Dimitri said, dryly. “Now that you have suggested it, I will simply wish one away.”

“You are _crabby_ ,” Sylvain said. He wondered how far he could pull out a crab to pirate reference without it sounding awkward, but Dimitri was a bad audience. He was staring over Sylvain’s shoulder where Mercedes was still comforting Felix.

The guilt that had plagued Ingrid last night started to affect Sylvain. “Last night go okay? Sorry, I wasn’t available, but you know how it is.”

“I do not,” Dimitri said, stiffly. Then he sighed and turned away from Sylvain (although more likely turned away from staring at Felix). “It went as well as to be expected as things generally do between us.”

Ouch. Sylvain rubbed the back of his neck, feeling incredibly guilty now and wondering if Ingrid was right about the whole don’t meddle in your friends’ life thing. Of course thinking of Ingrid made him think about she’d fallen asleep during the second movie he’d talked her into and used his arm for a pillow. She looked cuter sleeping than she did eating, which was saying something.

“Dimitri?” Sylvain asked. “Can I talk to you about something?” At Dimitri’s hesitant expression, he added. “It’s serious.”

Dimitri’s hesitation left him completely and he nodded. “Of course.”

Sylvain mussed up his own hair and then shoved his hands in his back pockets. “I’m in love with Ingrid.”

Dimitri stood there. He didn’t look shocked. He looked like he was waiting for Sylvain to keep talking. After an awkward moment of silence, Dimitri asked, “Yes? And what is the serious matter?”

“That!” Sylvain said. He threw his hands into the air and paced away from Dimitri, trying to burn off his nervous energy.

“You… were not aware of this?” Dimitri asked.

Wow, when Felix said everyone knew, he really fucking meant it. Even Dimitri. _Dimitri_.

Sylvain turned back towards him. “Why would I be,” he gestured to all of himself, “if I knew that?”

Dimitri gave a helpless shrug. “I do not know, but I generally do not understand your reasons for doing things.” He winced. “I didn’t mean that in a… negative way, I only meant you are very unique.”

Sylvain didn’t know whether to laugh or take that really personally. “I should do something about it right?”

“Not right before her performance, no,” Dimitri said.

“I’m not Claude and Hilda,” Sylvain scoffed.

He was suddenly overcome with the urge to watch Ingrid’s performance. He would’ve anyway—she was so good on the drums. It was like all her inhibitions let loose and that repressed powerhouse energy came out in a rhythm that tore the house down. Fuck.

“I’m going to tell her. I have to tell her,” Sylvain said. “If I’d _known_ I would have said something earlier. Why wouldn’t I, if I knew?”

“She was dating Glenn,” Dimitri pointed out.

“I’ve loved Ingrid _that_ long?” Sylvain could not stand the way Dimitri was looking at him. It was like a mix of sympathy and judgement. He hated that look. “Well, fuck it, I’m telling her. After her performance.”

“Could you not also wait until after _our_ performance?” Dimitri asked.

He thought Ingrid was going to ruin Sylvain’s concentration with whatever heartbreak he was angling up to. Sure that was a strong possibility, but Sylvain couldn’t count how many rehearsals and performances they had as the Blue Lions fresh off getting tormented by Miklan and he’d been fine. Still…

“Okay, fine… I should figure out a more romantic setting anyway, but I’m telling her today. What’s the point in waiting?” Sylvain asked. “If I know I’m in love with her then why would I sit around driving myself insane while she ends up moving on with someone else? I have to at least take a shot. The worst that happens is I get it confirmed I have no chance, but right now… there’s a chance.”

Dimitri didn’t say anything. When Sylvain glanced over he wasn’t looking at him, he was frowning at the floor.

“Cupcake?” came the annoyingly cheerful voice of Replacement Redhead. Sylvain glared at her but then looked down at the tray of equally cheerful looking cupcakes. “Are you trying to poison us with glitter?”

“It’s edible,” Annette said. “And no. I’m not Hilda or Claude.”

“Hah!” Sylvain’s momentary good humor went back to suspicion as she held out the cupcake to him.

“Ugh,” Annette groaned. “I’ve eaten like four of these already. They’re fine.” She proved her point by taking a bite of it. “It’s cream cheese frosting,” she added, sweetening the pot.

Sylvain took one of the least glittery pieces from her little tray and watched as Dimitri shook his head politely when offered. Annette was offering Dedue some from her tray when Sylvain decided he should save his for Ingrid and went to go watch her perform.

Ingrid and the Valiant Knights completely killed it, but the Ashen Wolves passed to the next round instead. Byleth’s reputation as a demon on the mic wasn’t undersold.

“Commiseration cupcake?” Sylvain offered.

Ingrid shook her head, obviously disappointed if she was turning down food. She was putting on a brave face and it killed him.

“Shouldn’t you be getting ready for your own performance?”

“Nah, I have time.” The PA was waving him down and Dedue and Dimitri were gesturing him over to where they were setting up. Sylvain ignored them. “You were fantastic, Ingrid.”

Ingrid’s nose crinkled and she frowned. “They were better.”

“We’ll get them next time!” Caspar said, coming around the corner. “Oh, hey cupcake—Raph!”

Sylvain was surprised he still had a hand left after Raphael snatched the cupcake out of it. He’d never seen anyone eat something so fast and he’d grown up with Ingrid. It did make Ingrid laugh, which was better than resigned chivalric losing Ingrid, so he couldn’t be upset.

Okay now the PA was yelling at him. “Gotta go,” Sylvain said and without thinking leaned in and kissed Ingrid on the forehead. Her surprised look was too much and a stream of, “Yepseeyalater,” popped out of his mouth as he scooted off in the other direction as quickly as possible.

Sylvain was pretty sure that was one of their best sets so far. The power of Dimitri’s voice was pretty much bending the crowds towards them and he was putting more of himself into the songs than he had before—almost like when they’d been the Blue Lions.

Plus the sympathy from the pirate patch should have worked in their favor.

Should have.

Annette was a peppy cupcake making nightmare with the backing of two cute girls (one of which was a beast on the drums) and the full arsenal of Felix’s song writing. They had no chance. Sylvain wanted to be surprised when the Swamp Beasties won, but he wasn’t.

“Wanna get commiseration cupcakes?” Sylvain asked Dimitri and Dedue, sullenly.

♪

Felix had never been more relieved to get on stage in his life. He was completely free of the usual nerves and only wanted the distraction of focusing on the music and playing with Annette, Mercedes, and Marianne.

By the time they called it that they were onto the next round, the _final_ round, Felix had almost completely forgotten the horror show that was this morning. Almost. It was hard not to be reminded with Sylvain, Dedue, and the man who he nailed in the eye with his phone moments after making out, coming towards them.

“I cannot _believe_ we made it to the final round!” Annette said, her enthusiasm and cheer almost contagious. She grabbed his hand and squeezed before jumping up on her feet. She was glowing with sweat. She’d been pretty into the set, but not enough for that much sweat—plus her hand was kinda clammy.

“Are you okay?” Felix asked, and Annette waved him off.

“I’m better than okay!”

“Congrats, I _guess_ ,” Sylvain said, the pettiness oozing off him in satisfying waves that fed Felix’s competitive side.

“Yes, congratulations,” Dimitri said—it was impossible to look at with the bandaged eye. Or maybe in general.

Dedue started to repeat his congratulations but then excused himself. Dimitri used that as an excuse to make an exit too and Felix wished he was surprised. His good mood was fading fast and starting to sour.

There was clatter to the floor. Marianne had dropped one of her drumsticks. Felix grabbed it, but when he went to hand it back to her, she looked unwell and mumbled, “I don’t… think I feel so good.”

Mercedes put the back of her hand on Marianne’s forehead. “You’re a little warm.”

“Marianne!” Annette exclaimed, with a hop. “You can’t—you can’t get—”

Annette suddenly looked wan and then practically teleported to the nearest trashcan, vomiting into it. Felix went to hold her hair back without even thinking about it.

Felix roped Sylvain into helping him get Annette and Marianne back to the hotel room. Mercedes grilled them about their symptoms and what they’d done that day once they were settled.

“Annie!” Mercedes exclaimed suddenly, while Felix was getting the girls some water. “You didn’t!”

Annette smiled gratefully as Felix handed her the water. “I didn’t what?”

Mercedes stood up and shook her head. “They weren’t refrigerated.”

“So?” Annette asked, taking a sip of her water and making a face. She still looked pretty bad. Felix wondered if he should go to the pharmacy, but he wasn’t sure what they needed. Mercie was better at that stuff. “They tasted fine.”

“They were cream cheese frosting, Annie,” Mercedes scolded. She looked over at Marianne who lying with a cold washcloth covering her eyes. She’d been in and out of the bathroom since they’d gotten to the hotel. Then Mercedes looked at Felix. “They have food poisoning.”

Felix’s moment of enjoying actually winning and moving onto the final round immediately flattened. He sighed and sat down. “So much for the final round.”

The door opened and Sylvain made a grandiose entrance holding an array of sprite, ginger-ale, and saltines. “Room service!”

Annette immediately burst into tears. “This is all my fault! We were so close!”

“Annie, it’s fine,” Felix said. He hated when she cried. And it wasn’t like it was important enough to get upset about—they’d gotten what they came for with the exposure. “It’s not a big deal. I’ll go talk to the organizer and drop out.”

“Woah, woah,” Sylvain said, putting his pile of items down on the table closest to the entryway, dodging as Marianne made for the bathroom again. “You can’t quit!”

Mercedes sighed and sat next to Annette on the bed. She patted her hand, while she looked back at Sylvain. “Annie and Mari are not going to be in any shape to perform tomorrow.”

“You and Felix seem fine,” Sylvain said.

Felix scoffed at the idea. Like he and Mercedes could (or would) perform without the rest of the band.

Annette shot up and pointed at Sylvain. “Did you eat the cupcake?” she practically screamed.

Sylvain took a step back. “Uh, no? I was saving it for Ingrid but the friendly ogre in her band took it."

Annette fell backwards again and sobbed into her hands. “I’ve ruined everything!”

“Annie,” Mercedes said patiently. “No one is saying that. Although we should contact whoever else might have eaten one.”

“I’m going to go check on Dedue,” Sylvain said, making his way towards the door. He pointed at Felix, walking backwards out of it. “Don’t drop out!”

Felix ignored him. He spent the next hour replacing the girls’ cold washcloths and convincing Annie that everything was fine and the contest didn’t matter. He wasn’t enough of a competitive asshole to want her to sing sick. Mercedes tag-teamed with him and kept Annette and Marianne hydrated.

Felix’s phone rang with obnoxious honking and he was going to murder Sylvain if he didn’t get that ringtone off his phone. He stepped away from the girls, closer to the small dining setup, before answering. “Is Dedue okay?”

Sylvain sounded way too cheerful. That was literally never a good sign. “No, he’s living in the bathroom and refuses to let anyone help. Dimitri’s probably crashing with me tonight, though I’m sure he more comfortable with you… how did that go by the way?”

“Did you need something?” Felix asked. If he called and didn’t text there was a reason beyond continuing to torture Felix.

“Did you drop out yet?” Sylvain asked. There was some kind of manic energy in his voice that worried Felix.

“Not yet,” Felix said. He sighed as he realized he should probably do that sooner rather than later. It wasn’t fair to have the organizers scrambling more than they already would be. He hated quitting, but there was no way around it.

“Don’t! I came up with a plan.”

Felix pressed his knuckles against the bridge of his nose. “Unless your plan involves time travel, we have to drop out, Sylvain.”

“Actually you don’t,” Sylvain said. “I read through all the rules and you are allowed substitutions in case of illness as long as one of the original band members is there.”

Felix scoffed in annoyance. “And where am I going to find a drummer and singer, who know all of our songs, _and_ can fill in last second?”

Sylvain didn’t answer, but there was an ominous knock on the room door. Felix walked over and opened it. Sylvain was holding his phone still up by his ear and grinning. Ingrid and Dimitri were behind him, looking resigned more than anything else.

Sylvain hung up the phone and splayed his arms wide. “Let’s get the band back together!”

Felix shut the door on him.

♪

“How the fuck did you get rehearsal space this time of day?” Felix asked. Dimitri supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised that Sylvain was able to convince him, since he’d managed to convince both he and Ingrid beforehand.

Sylvain shrugged as he set up his equipment. “Black Card and nepotism.”

Ingrid’s sigh was harried and annoyed, but she didn’t comment as she took her place by the drum set that also appeared to have been transported here last minute. It was entirely likely Sylvain bought a new one. Dimitri couldn’t imagine any of this had been cheap.

Dimitri observed as Felix set up his own equipment, muttering something to himself. Sylvain stretched his arms over his head and grinned at Dimitri, waggling his eyebrows. “Can you believe Replacement Redhead was my ally in this?” He rested his palms against the back of his neck. “Maybe I’ll start calling her Annette. She can talk Felix into _anything_ with those puppy dog eyes.”

They were not in a particular large rehearsal space. Dimitri didn’t know the acoustics, so he couldn’t help but pitch his voice lower to ask Sylvain if Annette and Felix were involved. Judging by Sylvain’s undignified laugh, Dimitri assumed the answer was no.

Dimitri distracted himself by tuning his guitar—though it was more likely he wouldn’t need to play with Felix there.

It seemed Dimitri couldn’t help but turn his thoughts to Felix. Before he’d scratched his cornea with an errant Crest phone, Dimitri had been calmly talking himself back from the ledge he’d jumped towards when he woke up like…that. He knew it wasn’t fair to push Felix, especially considering how far he’d come in the new life he’d made for himself. Felix’s band was excellent and the only reason they were all here like this again.

And yet…

It was impossible to drive Sylvain’s rambling about wasting time from his mind. If Felix wasn’t with anyone _now_ that didn’t mean he wouldn’t be in the future. More than once, Dimitri had the unfortunate view of Felix speaking with the lavender haired Yuri of the Ashen Wolves, better known as the ex-boyfriend Dimitri was fully aware of from how many times he’d looked at their tagged photos. Jealousy was unfair and unhealthy, but Dimitri could not help it.

And if there was a chance Felix did still feel the same… It wasn’t as if he’d been resistant this morning. In fact, he’d been the opposite, enthusiastic and warm. Dimitri could still feel the way he’d gripped at his shirt, as if he hadn’t already been crushing him enough.

“Okay,” Felix said, drawing him out of his thoughts. “I texted you the link to the set I put together. It’s got some of the old stuff that should be familiar enough. We can play Pegasi Run if you guys still know it.”

“Of course,” Ingrid said, smiling and more at ease now that she was in her natural habitat behind the drums.

“What about True Chivalry?” Sylvain asked.

“No,” Felix said immediately. Then he turned away and picked up his guitar.

It took several arduous hours to feel even moderately confident that they all had the set down well enough to perform tomorrow. It had taken far less time to feel natural playing together again. Dimitri had felt similarly, the first time he’d joined Sylvain to play again—but this was different. It was as if they were all returning to a much better time, but had kept everything from the present.

So perhaps…

Dimitri cleared his throat, partially to get Felix’s attention, partially because he’d been singing for hours. “Would you mind if I spoke with you?”

Felix shrugged, then reached into his bag to pull out an unopened water bottle which he handed to Dimitri. “You sound like you swallowed a razor.”

Dimitri’s laugh was quiet as he drank down most of the bottle in one go. He felt better afterwards and sounded a little less strained. “Adjusting to songs written for a soprano was a bit much for me.”

“Sorry,” Felix said. “I tried to adjust it as much as I could.” He fiddled with the strap of his bag as they walked out into the relative privacy of the street outside the studio.

It was colder now than it had been during the day and Dimitri greatly preferred it. Felix surprisingly wrapped his arms tighter around himself as if he were cold.

“You’ve acclimatized,” Dimitri said.

Felix’s mouth twisted and he didn’t look at Dimitri. He leaned against the wall, bending a knee to press his boot against it as well. “You wanted to talk?”

“Yes,” Dimitri said. He had felt less pressure facing down the large crowd of Gronder Field today than he did now. “About this morning…”

Felix looked away, appearing to wince. “How is your eye feeling?”

“Oh, it’s fine,” Dimitri said. “I won’t mind getting my depth perception back, but the medic said if I kept it covered for the next week or so it would be all right.”

Dimitri cleared his throat again and finished what was left in the water bottle. “I meant… before that.”

The streetlights illuminated Felix in a way that drew shadows to certain parts of his face. “We don’t have to talk about that.”

“If—” Dimitri was going to say if he didn’t want to talk about it, that was fine, but that was the coward’s way out. Dimitri took a step forward so that he was a bit closer and Felix glanced up at him. “I need to say something—I am deeply sorry for how we ended things.”

Felix closed his eyes and sighed. “Dimitri…”

“Please let me finish,” Dimitri said. “I was not in a good place for many reasons—and the misdiagnosis hadn’t made it easier. However, that doesn’t… that doesn’t mean I am not aware that I hurt you.”

Felix’s eyes opened but he didn’t look up at Dimitri. He also didn’t interrupt, so Dimitri kept on. “I should have tried to call you when I was in recovery, but I… I was afraid. You were doing well away from it all and I felt as if I would drag you under again.”

“You didn’t drag me under,” Felix said, still staring at the sidewalk. “We were all grieving and handling it badly. You… I didn’t know how to deal with what you were going through.”

“I didn’t let you,” Dimitri said, seeing Felix’s reaction to that immediately. His hands gripped at his sides and a muscle in his cheek jumped. “Felix…”

Felix’s throat bobbed and he looked up, somewhere in the direction of Dimitri, without making actual eye contact. “It’s—” He didn’t seem to know how to finish that statement and merely stared down again, somewhere near Dimitri’s shoes.

 _Don’t be a coward._ Glenn used to say. _Brave is only scary for the second before you do it._

Dimitri took a deep breath. “I have no interest in moving past the fact that I have not for one second stopped being irrevocably in love with you.”

Felix’s head snapped up again. His eyes were wide and the shadows of the street lighting were making his hair look almost black. Dimitri wanted to kiss him badly, even more so than he had in a haze of sleep this morning.

Except that Felix did not respond. He merely stared up at Dimitri with an expression of complete shock. Dimitri’s pulse raced in a way that sank through the layers of his skin and made him feel uncomfortably weightless. He tried to smother the anxiety, but seconds passed and Felix was still silent.

“If… if you don’t feel the same, then at least say something, Felix,” Dimitri said. “I can respect that, but I — could you at least tell me so?”

Felix still stared, silent.

Dimitri’s throat felt sore and tight from more than the rehearsal. He nodded and looked away. “Yes, I… suppose it was — I shouldn’t have expected anything else. You were always better at moving forward.”

Another second or so ticked by, but still Felix said nothing, so Dimitri said, “I will see you tomorrow.”

“Yeah,” Felix said, finally.

When Dimitri looked back at him, he truly wished he hadn’t. Felix was almost fearful. Dimitri had only caused that expression once and it was not a good memory. Thinking of it now was doing nothing for the anxiousness trying to override his system. He walked off, the chill of the night air, buoying him as he made his way back to the hotel.

♪

Ingrid stretched her arms and then her back, far enough to hear a satisfying crack. She probably shouldn’t have enjoyed cheating on her band like this, but it was fun to play with the boys again. Ashe was wonderful, but Felix was so good at giving her creative arrangements to work with—even if her sound probably fit the Valiant Knights better. Maybe she’d get them together once this was over to talk about song composition.

“You want to get pizza or something?” Sylvain asked, after Dimitri and Felix had left.

Ingrid put her sticks in her back pocket and rolled her eyes, fondly. “Nothing is open at this hour, Sylvain.”

“I could bribe them to open,” Sylvain said carelessly.

Ingrid sighed, remembering his blasé attitude about however much it must have cost to rent this rehearsal space (and Ingrid was worried, _purchase_ a new drum set since she’d needed to remove some plastic). “Sylvain…”

“Marry me,” Sylvain said.

Ingrid felt as if she’d been been hit with a bolt of lightning. She blinked furiously and stared up at him. “What?”

Sylvain did not have his usual sardonic teasing face. He had the cheerful energy of when he thought he had a perfect idea—such as their band reunion. “My father’s always getting on my case about how I’m not doing anything with the family legacy and I should settle down. If I marry you, you’d have nothing to worry about money wise.”

Ingrid felt her eyebrows lower to meet the frown that was pinching. “That isn’t funny.”

“I’m not joking!” Sylvain said. “It’s perfect. We get to be together and waste my father’s fortune at the same time. I could buy you a yard-long sub as an engagement present! Hell, I’ll buy the sandwich shop.”

“That isn’t funny!” Ingrid said again, sharper this time. There was a shallow feeling pressing down on her chest, like the space that had collapsed when Glenn died was being pushed up again. “You can’t—marriage is a _big deal_ , Sylvain, not one of your little projects. I can’t believe you think this is funny.”

Sylvain raked a hand through his hair, finally looking less cheerful at least. She waited for his apology, but was not expecting the next words out of his mouth. “Okay, I went about it wrong, but I meant, I love you. I want to be with you. We’d be great together and I thought this would…”

“You _what_?” Ingrid’s eyes widened and she looked for the joke on his face.

“Oh,” Sylvain said. “So you are the only other person that didn’t know.”

Ingrid breathed out in a huff and pressed her fingers to that spot on her chest. “Sylvain, please—whatever practical joke you’re playing, it isn’t funny. I can’t believe you would…”

“I’m not playing a joke,” Sylvain said, and he took the hand off her chest and into his own. He pressed it onto his chest in the same spot and looked at her with all the sincerity he must have shown a thousand girls and it was wrenchingly painful to see it reflected at her. “I don’t know what took me so long to figure it out, but Ingrid it’s always been you.”

Ingrid shoved him. Angry tears stung her eyes. “You! I cannot believe you!”

Sylvain looked confused of all things, of course he did. He always thought his half-assed impulses would work out. “Ingrid?”

“I’m not… how could—I am _not_ a way to keep the friendships you miss together,” Ingrid said, pushing past the waver in her voice. “You can’t manipulate us into being the people we were when we were seventeen, Sylvain.”

Sylvain frowned. “I know that. That’s… Ingrid, I was serious. If you don’t want to get married then I can still take care of—”

Ingrid shoved him again. “Don’t you dare!” The room felt so small and she couldn’t believe this. She couldn’t believe him. “Sylvain José Gautier, you cannot solve every fucking problem with money. You keep trying to drag us into the past, because you refuse to do anything to get your life together now. The band is _never_ getting back together. We broke for a reason.”

“Ingrid,” Sylvain said, clearly frustrated. “You’re not getting what I’m saying.”

“Then stop saying it,” Ingrid snapped. Her hands were shaking and she could feel herself overwhelmed with the urge to overwhelm herself with tears and refused to do it over this. “You are always so incredibly thoughtless, but this is a new low.”

She didn’t wait for his response and stormed out.

♫ ♫ ♫

#### Five Years Earlier

♫ ♫ ♫

Felix’s bedroom door slammed open way too fast and almost caused him to jump out of his skin. “Glenn, what the hell?”

His brother leaned against the doorframe grinning and then looked around. “Sorry, thought Dimitri was in here.”

“And?” Felix asked. “You graduated, asshole. You’re not his coach anymore.”

“Captains aren't—” Glenn shook his head. “Never mind, you’re too much of a nerd to explain it to.”

“What do you want?” Felix asked, sharply.

“You sure he’s not like hiding under the bed or something?” Glenn asked and then flopped down on Felix’s bed like he was testing the theory.

“Get your fucking gross feet off my bed,” Felix snapped, kicking at him. “He’s not here. He’s at practice.”

Glenn traced something in the air, ignoring Felix’s irritation as per usual. “Does he even sleep? Between your guys’ band, practice, school, and deflowering my sweet baby brother, I don’t know how he has the time to—”

Felix jumped onto him, slamming his knee into Glenn’s stomach. “Shut up!”

Glenn laughed at him and they tussled until he had Felix’s head in his armpit and made him yield. Felix sat on the floor, letting his asshole brother have the bed. “What do you want?”

“Nothing, just promised Dad I’d come in every half hour when you and Dimitri were up here to make sure you weren’t having sex.”

Felix put his head on his knees and groaned. “He did not say that.”

Glenn laughed. “Of course he didn’t. He got weird, coughed, and implied it and then _I_ said it. He turned red and said ‘ _Glenn_ ’ in that exasperated voice.”

Felix’s embarrassment was slightly overridden by the unavoidable snort at Glenn’s perfect imitation of their father. When he looked up, Glenn was giving him a weird look. “What?”

“What are you working on?”

Felix’s laptop was still open. He got up and shut it. “Nothing.”

“Felix!”

“It’s nerd stuff,” Felix parroted back to him.

Glenn’s mouth twisted. “I’m not going to make fun of your music, Fe.” His serious face morphed easily into a sick smile. “I have so much else to work with for that.”

“Would you get out?” Felix asked, with an annoyed sigh. He _had_ been working on something.

“No, let me hear,” Glenn demanded, and casually slapped the back of Felix’s head.

Felix rubbed the back of his head and glared at him. “It’s not done yet.”

“So?” Glenn asked, sitting up finally. His expression shifted back to a little more serious. “I swear I’m not going to make fun of you. I like hearing your stuff.”

Felix narrowed his eyes at him.

Glenn laughed at him. “I mean it.” He breathed out and brushed a hand through his short dark curls. “It’s kinda cool you got Mom’s music gene.”

Felix never knew how to feel when Glenn brought their mother up. She’d died when he was three. He could sometimes remember a vague version of her face, the smell of her perfume, and a song that always got stuck in his head, but in end he wasn’t sure if those were actually memories or something he’d picked up from Glenn and his father talking about her.

It was the only topic he could completely trust Glenn not to joke about though.

“If you make fun of me, I’m going to rat you out for every time you snuck out of the house to smoke weed,” Felix threatened.

Glenn made the sign of the Goddess and sat up on the bed, expectantly. Felix felt completely awkward, but picked up his guitar and then sat down in his chair. He spun around so he wasn’t looking at Glenn. Felix strummed out a little of what he was working on and after being harassed about being a wuss, sang a little of it too.

Glenn didn’t make fun of him. When Felix was finished, he clapped loudly. “Fuck, you’re talented for a little shit.”

“Shut up,” Felix said, his face feeling too hot.

“Goddess, learn to take a compliment, Felix,” Glenn said and shook his head. “You and Dad, I swear. It’s like you completely shut down when someone says something nice.”

“Better than the way you feed your ego with compliments,” Felix muttered, still feeling embarrassed.

Glenn laughed and leaned back. “Play me some more, Fe.”

“No,” Felix said, then looked at him sideways. “You can come to the showcase if you want to.”

Glenn’s face fell a little. “I don’t know if I’ll be back from Duscur in time—oh don’t make that face I can’t beat _myself_ up if you cry.”

“I’m not crying!” Felix snapped, shoving down the disappointment. It wasn’t like it really mattered.

Glenn sighed and pushed himself up off the bed, ruffling Felix’s hair. “I will have Dad be a terrible videographer and demand every single detail when I get back, how’s that?”

Felix shrugged one shoulder. “I guess.”

“What’s the name of that one you just played?” Glenn asked, leaning against the wall now.

“True Chivalry,” Felix said, quietly.

Glenn seemed to think that over and nodded. “Not terrible.”

“Am I supposed to take that as a compliment?” Felix stared up at him and tried not to join in as Glenn laughed.

♪

Sylvain resisted the urge to lean his head too far back and stoppered the blood coming out his nose with one hand while the other one pinched the bridge of his nose. He was going to have a black eye probably.

Better than getting thrown out of the car while it was moving, he supposed. It was going to be at least a few hours until it was safe to get home, so he waited until the bleeding had mostly stopped and then headed to Felix’s. Might as well get in some early band practice.

“What the fuck happened to you?” Glenn asked as the door swung open.

“Hit on a married woman,” Sylvain lied easily. “Her husband didn’t appreciate it.”

“Right,” Glenn said, and put a hand on his shoulder dragging him towards the kitchen. He sat Sylvain down and grabbed a bag of frozen peas handing it to Sylvain. It was instant relief when he put it on his face.

“Sylvain… you know, if something’s going on at home, you can tell me. Or my dad. Like, he’s cool with your parents, but not if they’re—”

Sylvain cut him off. “Father Gautier is still firmly in the make me feel like shit with words camp. It would be uncouth of him to lash out so physically.”

“If you say so,” Glenn said, but didn’t sound like he believed him.

Miklan hadn’t made good on his threat to kill Sylvain yet—he’d been hearing that since he was six. Then again Sylvain had never _told_ anyone, so maybe finally cracking that seal would bring down whatever was more effective than locking him in a dryer for a day.

“You want to crash here tonight?” Glenn offered.

“Sure,” Sylvain said, glad the bag of peas was covering his face. It felt… embarrassing to accept the help, but it also not going home tonight sounded fucking great.

“Actually,” Glenn said. “I’m leaving for Duscur soon. I’ll be gone for at least a couple of months, if you want to use my room after band practice. I’m sure Felix and Dad wouldn’t give a shit.”

“I…” Sylvain cleared his throat, feeling like some of the blood had gotten there anyway. At least the swelling was going down. “Maybe. Thanks.”

♪

Ingrid was leaning back and staring at the clouds pass by, fairly comfortable when Glenn held an onion ring in front of her face.

“Promise rings are weird, right?” Glenn asked.

Ingrid turned to look at him. “They are if they’re edible.”

Glenn responded to that with a fond smile that made her feel lighter.

Ingrid pushed herself up to sitting, brushing the grass off her back. “Why do you ask?”

Glenn stared down at the onion ring he was holding, which seemed to hold more significance than the fact that it had snuck in with the french-fries he’d ordered. “I got accepted early to the University of Derdriu.”

“Oh!” Ingrid brightened immediately and grasped his arm. “Glenn, that’s fantastic! That medical school is one of the best in Fódlan.”

“Yeah and it’s also a two day drive,” Glenn said.

Ingrid knew this was coming. Glenn had gone to Charon College, a local Faerghus school that wasn’t really going to fulfill his dreams of becoming a doctor like his mother. She knew he’d have to leave at some point, but she hoped she had a little more time before it happened.

“What do you want to do?” Ingrid asked.

“I _don’t_ want to be the weird college guy who makes his girlfriend uproot her life for him,” Glenn said, twirling the onion ring around his finger.

“I didn’t ask what you didn’t want,” Ingrid pointed out. If she were less nervous she would’ve smiled at his persistent belief in her plentiful future options.

“I want to ask you to marry me,” Glenn said, and then added, “But you’re seventeen and I’m not really that much older, so that’s insane.”

If he’d asked her like a question, it would have been so simple to answer.

Instead, Ingrid took the onion ring from him and put it on her finger. “It’s not insane.” She smiled at his surprised expression and added, “When we’re both done with school.”

She doubted her family could afford U of D, but there were plenty of good schools nearby she could apply to and if all else failed, they would be long distance for a while.

Glenn tucked her hair behind her ear and smiled his best smile. “Sounds like a plan.”

♪

“I can’t believe I let Sylvain talk me into this,” Felix said, holding his neck with both hands. He was so tense, he appeared ready to bolt out the door..

Dimitri managed to pry at least one of his hands free and threaded his fingers through it. “If I can manage, you can manage.”

“You’re used to people looking at you,” Felix countered.

Dimitri shook his head. “We’ll still be up there with you. And you have a really beautiful voice.”

Felix scoffed and looked away from him. “It’s whatever. Better than Ingrid maybe.”

“That’s an extremely low bar,” Dimitri said. “It’s one song, Felix.”

“Yeah,” Felix said with a shrug. He turned and pressed his face into Dimitri’s shoulder. Dimitri wrapped his free arm around him. “How’d you get over being in front of everyone? You hated it when started.”

To be fair, Dimitri still disliked it, but he didn’t think that would help Felix’s nerves. “I don’t look at the audience, I look at you.”

Felix lifted his head and stared at him, incredulous. “You do not.”

“I do, you’re always focused on your guitar so you don’t notice.”

Felix flushed and looked away from him. “You’re a sap.”

Dimitri snorted at the hypocrisy. “I am not the one who wrote their secret feelings about their crush into songs for the last two years.”

Felix pressed his hand into his face. “This is not helping, Dimitri.”

Dimitri tried to fight down his smile and pulled Felix closer again. “You’ll be fine. Stare at the floor. Pretend you’re in your room. The lights should be too bright to see the audience too closely if you look up anyway.”

Felix muttered something into Dimitri’s chest and stayed that way for a moment, until Dimitri’s phone buzzed. He released Felix to check it.

**Glenn Fraldarius** Glenn Fraldarius  
  
**Dimitri:** Yes, you should still board the plane. Felix has yet to jump out the window.  
  
**Glenn:** hahaha, start a betting pool for hwen **Glenn:** i feel like damn princess in your parents car **Glenn:** i wanna feel like this all the time from now on **Glenn:** running a little late, but should still make it in time. This was a great idea, D. I shall carve you a Good Boyfriend trophy. **Glenn:** take a pic of fe's shocked face for me... it's adorable  
  


“Good news?” Felix asked.

Dimitri’s smile widened, but he resisted the impulse to give into Glenn’s request and take a picture—he wanted Felix’s reaction for himself. “Yes. My parents picked Glenn up from the airport.”

Felix blinked at him, scrunching his brow in confusion. “What?”

“I knew you wanted him here for the showcase, so I talked him into coming down early to see it.”

“He wasn’t supposed to be back for another two weeks—” Felix cut himself off as his eyes misted over. His lip trembled as he focused on holding any tears back. Dimitri gave him a moment, knowing he was more self-conscious about his habit of wearing his emotions so openly as of late. Then Felix turned back to him and dragged Dimitri into a kiss. Breaking for breath and resting his forehead against Dimitri, he said, “All my songs are _still_ about you.”

♫ ♫ ♫

#### Present Day

♫ ♫ ♫

Sylvain felt like shit when he woke up. He dragged himself out of bed and rubbed his hands over his face, staring jealously at Dimitri, curled up around a pillow sleeping comfortably. He’d been asleep when Sylvain had gotten back, which was weird since Dimitri was usually an insomniac.

Sylvain grabbed his phone to check on Dedue.

**da dude** da dude  
  
**Sylvain:** how you feeling this morning, my man? Need me to grab you anything?  
  
**Dedue:** That is unnecessary, but thank you. **Dedue:** Mercedes came by last night to apologize and brought me a few things. **Sylvain:** oOooOohhh did she now?? 😈  
  
**Dedue:** Sylvain. **Sylvain:** don't worry I will wait until youre not married to the toilet to make fun of ur new bride  
  
**Dedue:** Very generous of you.  
  


Sylvain snorted and looked over at Dimitri—then at the time. He debated if he should quietly dress and grab coffee down at the lobby or if he could make some on the tiny pot provided by the hotel without waking him. Dimitri stirred as if he could sense he was being a minor inconvenience to someone and solved the dilemma.

Sylvain made enough coffee for both of them and put his feet up on the table with a sigh.

“You ever wish you could reset the last couple of days and have a do-over?” Sylvain asked as the coffee brewed.

Dimitri responded in a sleepy cracked voice, “Ye-s.” Then he cleared his throat. “Y-es.”

Dimitri cleared his throat again and pushed himself out of bed. He went to the mini fridge and took out one of the bottles of water. It was an expensive treat, but Sylvain would throw more money around—because apparently he didn’t know how to do anything else. A true Gautier fuckup.

Dimitri chugged the water. “Sy-l-vain,” he said, his voice cracking around each syllable, and then looked panicked.

“Oh, fuck me,” Sylvain said as he realized what that meant.

Then the coffee finished.

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

“Hey!” said Claude von Riegan, sound mixer and too-many-instruments-to-name player of Hilda & the Schemers (one of at least four names they’d gone through in the last year). “Just because we have a song named Mild Stomach Poison doesn’t mean we’d _actually_ poison the competition.”

“Right?” Hilda Goneril, namesake and lead singer, said in agreement. “Like, it’s one thing to throw a party so that your competition is a little hungover the next day, but to accuse us of actually poisoning someone is super rude!”

She turned and kicked their drummer, Leonie Pinelli who was twirling a stick in her hand and not paying attention. “What?”

“Defend us!”

“From what?”

Hilda groaned. “Lorenz!” she cried out, “You’re our manager, do something to protect our good name!”

“We have a good name?” Leonie asked and Claude hid a laugh behind his fist that he turned into a cough.

“Hil, Lorenz took the day off to supervise cleaning of his penthouse because of our unauthorized two day rager,” Claude said. “Remember?”

“Oh, right,” Hilda said and then let out a deep sigh. “Look, I’m _really_ sorry it happened, but we didn’t have anything to do with it. We did not poison anyone!” She looked over at Claude, as if confirming.

Claude nodded. “Yeah, that’s a low despicable tactic that really would be too easy to track back to us, so why would we stoop to that level of novice sabotage?”

“Would not someone who had poisoned them say that?” Flayn asked.

“No?” Claude replied, looking bemused.

“Can we _please_ talk about something else?” Hilda asked. She pouted in Flayn (and the camera’s) direction. “I thought you were going to ask about my designs. I made a fish charm just for you.”

Flayn’s green eyebrows raised. “Really?”

“Yeah!” Hilda said and pulled out her phone to show Flayn a picture. “It’s back at the hotel, but see, it’ll go great with your eyes.”

“Oh, that is so nice! I love it,” Flayn said, forgetting the professional aspect of journalism over what was, in her defense, a very cute fish charm.

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

Felix had been certain that he couldn’t wake up feeling any worse than he had going to sleep. Then Sylvain texted to tell him that Dimitri had laryngitis from overusing his voice the night before.

“That’s it then,” Felix said, when they met downstairs. He was avoiding looking at any of them, but especially the person who’d told Felix that he still loved him last night while Felix stood there frozen like a fucking deer in headlights. “You gave it a shot, Sylvain.”

“We can’t give in, we’re so close!” Sylvain said. He was so invested in something that wasn’t even his band. Felix knew why, which was annoying.

Felix rubbed his temple. “Look, Annette’s still not feeling great and unless there’s some person I don’t know that knows all of the songs and can sing, we’re out.”

There wasn’t a response, so Felix made himself look up and regretted it immediately. Ingrid, Dimitri, and Sylvain were all giving him the same look.

“No,” he said.

“Felix!” Sylvain begged. “Come on!”

“No,” Felix repeated, feeling backed into a corner. “I—I can’t.”

“You can,” Ingrid said. “You don’t want to.”

“Fine, I _don’t_ want to,” Felix said. “I didn’t want to do this in the fucking first place, Annette made me and it’s—” He gestured to everything and then made the mistake of meeting Dimitri’s gaze and much like last night found it impossible to say anything else.

Dimitri looked down at his phone and tapped something into it. Sylvain’s phone immediately dinged and when he glanced at it, he snorted and then levied a look at Felix. “Fe, aren’t you always saying how life is about moving forward? You gotta escape that past and reclaim your voice.”

“I hate you,” Felix said, which Sylvain knew was as good as yes given his whooping yell and reluctantly returned high five with Dimitri. He tried to give one to Ingrid but she frostily ignored him.

Once they got to Gronder, Sylvain hooked an arm into Felix’s and dragged him off. “What?” Felix asked. It was either some unwanted stupid fashion advice or he knew what happened with Dimitri last night and wanted to talk about it. Both of those things made Felix feel nauseated. Or it could’ve been seeing the size of the crowd when they arrived.

“I completely fucked up last night,” Sylvain said.

Felix looked his best friend over—he didn’t see any of the usual signs that he was setting him up for a dirty joke. “With what?”

“Ingrid,” Sylvain said. “It’s your fucking fault,” he added. “I was living in blissful ignorance until you told me that I was in love with her. Which by the way, she _didn’t_ know.”

If Felix weren’t completely numb to all forms of heartbreak and anything involving relationships past, present, or future, he might have apologized. “So telling her how you felt didn’t go well?”

Sylvain dragged his hands over his face and then through his hair, tugging on it, with a pathetic whine. “I sorta proposed first.”

Felix could not have heard that right. “Come again?”

Sylvain looked over at him with his patented hangdog expression. “I asked Ingrid to marry me. I figured I could take care of her money problems and we could get together at the same time. Two birds, one stone, you know?”

Felix wasn’t sure if the strange feeling he had was relief, that he wasn’t the only person to completely fuck up last night. And Sylvain’s somehow, might have been worse. “Tell me you didn’t say it like that.”

Sylvain winced, confirming it was worse, and then held up his hands. “Help me.”

He must’ve been desperate if he was coming to Felix for advice, but even Felix could see what the fucking problem was. Felix hadn’t exactly grown up struggling, but refusing to accept any financial help when he got into college gave him a better knowledge of what money meant than Sylvain had ever grasped.

“Ingrid doesn’t give a shit about your money,” Felix said. He couldn’t believe he had to point out the obvious.

“I know that!” Sylvain said. “She’s not like every other girl I’ve dated, which is why I offered in the first place. I never would have done that for someone else! I… she’s always stressed out about bills and stuff and it’s the only thing I can do!”

Fucking Sylvain—

Felix kicked him in the shin. He waited until Sylvain’s stream of swearing passed to snap at him. “You can do anything, you colossal shithead. What do you think Ingrid and I talk about almost _all_ the time she visits?”

Sylvain was still rubbing his shin, because he was melodramatic. Felix had barely kicked him. “Me?”

“Yes, you,” Felix said. “You can talk anyone into anything, graduated fucking magna cum laude without even showing up to most of your classes—”

“Summa cum laude,” Sylvain corrected and snapped his mouth shut when Felix glared at him.

Felix pointed at him. “You even got us all here, right now. You’re the one who started the band in the first place.”

“That seemed to bug her too,” Sylvain said, looking honestly upset now without any sort of typical front. “She said I’m stuck in the past and I’m trying to—” He huffed out in annoyance and threw his hands in the air, looking incredibly sad and frustrated in a way he never let anyone see. “Caring about my friends isn’t trying to relive things. I just miss my friends. That’s not a crime.”

Felix dragged Sylvain into a rough hug, which caused him to almost startle out of his skin.

“What the hell is happening?”

“A hug, take it or I’ll kick you again,” Felix threatened, but it was pointless because Sylvain already was hugging him back like the affection starved person he pretended not to be.

“ _Why_ is it happening?” Sylvain asked.

Felix dropped his arms, wriggling away from Sylvain’s automatic attempt to extend the rare show of physical affection. “You were sincere. I reacted.”

“I’m always sincere,” Sylvain protested and relented when Felix shot a look at him. “I was trying to be sincere last night!” He scratched his head, frowning. “I mean, I thought I was.”

“You honestly want to marry Ingrid?” Felix asked. He’d always assumed any wedding of Sylvain’s would happen while blasted in Hrym by a Cethleann impersonator.

Sylvain stared off into the distance. His lips lifted in a small smile. “Yeah. I think I do.”

Felix was tired just looking at the open affection his face. “I don’t know why you’re even asking me for advice on how to talk to Ingrid. I couldn’t even—I can’t talk about the deep feelings shit.”

“Therapy could help,” Sylvain suggested, back to normal. Felix didn’t have the energy to get annoyed with him. Sylvain seemed to notice. “Are _you_ okay?”

Felix shrugged his shoulders. He breathed out and frowned. “Dimitri said he was still in love with me last night.”

“Wow,” Sylvain said. “And?”

“And nothing. I couldn’t think of anything to say.” Felix had felt like he’d swallowed his tongue when it had happened. A flooding rush of every moment past and present had overwhelmed him and in the end… “Maybe it’s a good thing it went to shit. He’s been doing better without me.”

Sylvain kicked him in the shin. It was telling of Felix’s mental state that he didn’t see it coming. “Dimitri only knows more social media than you, because he made me show him so he could internet stalk you. He’s not _remotely_ subtle about it, Dedue and I talk about it all the time.”

“I don’t have anything on the internet,” Felix said, refusing to rub his shin and give Sylvain the satisfaction.

Sylvain snorted. “Well yeah, that’s why it’s pathetic and—” He cut himself off and rubbed his chin, thinking something over before focusing in on Felix again. “How do you feel now—without thinking about all the guilt trip excuses and weighted backstory—about Dimitri and everything?”

“I…” Felix tried to put it into words, but it stayed stuck at the back of his throat like it had last night. It was like he knew the words and _knew_ that he knew them, but none of them would form into an actual sentence.

Sylvain waited, almost as long as Dimitri had for him to come up with something—anything and Felix… couldn’t.

“It’s… too much,” Felix finally said. “There’s too much trying to get out at once. I can’t say any of it.” He levied his finger at Sylvain when he opened his mouth. “Don’t say therapy again, asshole.”

Sylvain closed his mouth since obviously that had been his intention. Then he hummed and looked Felix over. “You could write a song about it. I mean, you never talked about Glenn, but shit Broken Sword almost made _me_ cry, Fe.”

Felix had reworked Broken Sword again and again, but it still kept coming out like it it did. Like pieces of himself would always be scattered, trying to avoid the gaping void Glenn left when he died.

Sylvain patted his shoulder. “I realize this is shit advice to give when we’re on in like an hour. Can _you_ even write a new song that quick?”

Felix took a shaky breath in, thinking of the other song he’d spent as much time on—trying to change and never coming out different. “No. Not a new one.”

♪

Sylvain really wished Ingrid didn’t look so pretty when she was mad at him. It was not helping. “Ah, hey,” he tried, casually and not at all weird, as he walked towards her.

Ingrid glanced back at him and then turned away again, saying nothing. This was worse than when she was upset with him and would lecture him into next week.

“I really didn’t mean to upset you last night,” Sylvain said, hoping he sounded earnest.

“I know,” Ingrid said, like a condemnation. Fuck.

“I was serious,” Sylvain added, wincing as Ingrid turned to glare at him. At least that was better than being frozen out. Progress? “I am serious,” he added. “I said it all wrong and I wasn’t thinking straight, but I meant it.”

“Which part?” Ingrid asked, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Proposing might have been a bit impulsive,” Sylvain admitted. “Also, I should’ve known better that— You always liked or hated me for who I was, not what I had.”

Ingrid sighed and looked away from him, her voice soft, “I never hated you, Sylvain.”

“I cut my strings—both purse and puppet,” Sylvain said suddenly. He didn’t know how else to get it out. “I have zero dollars in my bank account now, so if you want to live in poverty together, I am very much open to it.”

Ingrid’s annoyed noise was achingly familiar she turned to glare at him. “Sylvain…” Then she trailed off and looked at him, eyes widening. “What did you do?”

Sylvain laughed, slightly panicked now that everything was catching up to him. Fuck. “I uh… basically told my dad to go fuck himself.” He also felt… lighter. “No more shares to the company, signed ‘em over to an indie record label, which pissed Father Gautier off enough that he threatened to cut me off and I told him that would probably be the nicest thing he’s ever done for me.”

Ingrid was frozen in horrified shock. “You… Sylvain! What is _wrong_ with you?” she said, snapping out of it. “You can’t throw big gestures at me to make up for yesterday’s big gesture, that’s insane!”

“I didn’t do it for you,” Sylvain said. “I mean… a little, but mostly I did it for me.” His laugh was a little less panicked now, but still had the flavor of it. “If I make something of myself, it’ll be me doing it and not his legacy. I can make my own legacy.” He scrubbed his hands over his face. It had been impulsive but he didn’t regret it.

Unless he would prove his father right and _couldn’t_ make anything of himself. Failing and finally perfecting his fuckup act.

“I mean…” Sylvain breathed out. “I don’t know what I can do, but he can’t revoke my degree and I… I kinda liked talking to the indie label about what they could do with the shares? And there’s this song-writer Bernadetta. She freelances, but I think if she was given more support, she could produce. And I…”

He couldn’t read Ingrid’s expression, which meant it probably wasn’t anger or disappointment, but her green eyes did look a little glassy and he was going to kick himself in the shin if he made her cry.

“I want to see what I can do,” Sylvain said, since he’d gotten this far. “See what I’m made of, without the cloud of what I’m _supposed_ to be made of hanging over my head.”

Tears streamed down Ingrid’s face, but she was smiling. “That is all I ever wanted for you.”

Sylvain laughed, but felt like he might cry too. “I know, Ingrid. _That’s_ why I’m in love with you.”

Ingrid’s eyes widened a little and she took in a small, sharp breath. “You’re serious.”

He rubbed the back of his neck, feeling very exposed. “Very rarely, but right now, yeah.”

Ingrid had been holding drumsticks. Sylvain knew this because they fell to the floor with a clatter as she reached up and pulled him down to her level by his shoulders. Then she was kissing him. Then he was kissing her, because he knew how to do at least that much.

Except he didn’t, because kissing Ingrid was like nothing else. She dug her fingers into the base of Sylvain’s skull, dragging them in a way she used to do when they were kids and he was upset. He’d used the line before about how his arms fit perfectly around a girl, but with Ingrid they really did. He knew her and he was pretty sure he’d never been _this_ happy kissing someone.

He wasn’t sure he’d ever even been happy kissing someone.

Not if this was what it was like.

When they finally broke for air, Sylvain dragged her closer—refusing to let her go, nesting her perfectly under his chin as he nosed into her hair.

“Did you prepay your hotel bill?” Ingrid asked.

“Thank fuck yes,” Sylvain said, laughing. “I really don’t want to start my real adult life in debt from your chicken wing addiction.”

She smacked him halfheartedly on the chest and when he looked down at her she was smiling. “Why don’t I buy you dinner this time?”

“Celebration meal or commiseration?” Sylvain asked. Then remembered the other thing he came by for. “Oh, I almost forgot—Felix wants to change the set.”

“What?” Ingrid asked, familiarly annoyed. It was cute when it wasn’t directed at him. “We’re on in an _hour_.”

Sylvain shrugged. “They do it all the time in the movies with less time. You know, the guy gets to the stage, grabs the mic and is like, pick this up and follow me kinda thing.”

When Ingrid frowned at him, Sylvain kissed her nose to see if that would work to get rid of it, and was incredibly pleased when it did. “That sounds like a disaster.”

“Won’t know until we try it,” Sylvain said, meaning more than one thing, grinning at her.

Ingrid shook her head at him, but went up on her tiptoes to meet him when he kissed her again.

♪

Dimitri thought that perhaps it was a blessing in disguise that he’d lost his voice. He had the perfect excuse not to speak while waiting for their performance. It wasn’t a performance he wasn’t particularly enthused about and was grateful at least he only had to focus on playing the guitar and not actually emoting with his voice.

He wasn’t sure what he would be emoting.

Then of course, Felix added a last second change. It was difficult to convey his frustration with this, not merely because he couldn’t speak and Felix still wouldn’t look at him—but because it was such a small feeling compared to everything else.

“It’s basically the same as True Chivalry,” Felix said to them, while he went through the process of pinning his unevenly shorn hair back up. “Just… slower and in a different key.”

“So an entirely different song,” Ingrid said, with her hands on her hips.

Felix shrugged, disinterestedly. “Do whatever you want then,” he said and walked off.

“It’ll be like in the movies!” Sylvain said, cheerfully. Dimitri presumed he had the same look on his face that Ingrid was currently shooting at Sylvain. The difference being that Sylvain bent down and kissed Ingrid’s temple, mollifying her and Dimitri could only raise his eyebrows.

“Are you—” Dimitri attempted to ask, though the wheeze in his voice sounded too terrible to continue.

“Yep,” Sylvain said, grinning, before hoisting Ingrid up into an overly enthusiastic embrace. She protested, but laughed while she did it.

Dimitri forced a smile for them. He would be honestly happy for them… later. At the moment he allowed himself to stew in his bitter feelings. Then the Black Eagles stepped off the stage, looking fairly pleased with themselves.

Dimitri had no delusions that the Blue Beasties—the name Sylvain had suggested and been viciously rejected in favor of their old name—were going to win. He mainly wanted to get this over with.

The audience was larger than he expected, but Dimitri felt too numb to be bothered by any stage fright. The sound of their introduction washed over him as he waited for the cue to start. The only benefit to a last minute change was that Dimitri had to be completely focused on what he was doing and potentially improvise based on any changes Felix had made or what the others played like. There was no room in that complication for letting his mind drift.

It became difficult to remain numb once Felix started singing. It had been years since Dimitri had heard him do so. His singing voice remained more emotive and higher than his speaking voice, but there was an earnest confidence to it now that was lending well to the song choice.

The lyrics were vastly different than True Chivalry, which was not a surprise since Felix had called it Chivalry is Dead. They were almost depressing in comparison, which much like when Annette sang, didn’t pair completely with the way Felix was actually singing. Dimitri wasn’t paying too much attention to them, letting the words pass him by as he focused on playing.

When Felix’s feet came into Dimitri’s view of the floor, he couldn’t help glance up, but was not expecting to see Felix turned towards him—singing directly at him. Dimitri stumbled on the next chord and caught himself, unable to break from Felix’s sincere gaze and started to _listen_ to the lyrics.

> Rest here, no more wicked dreams
> 
> If I had the strength to carry us both
> 
> Writ to lore, carved in skin, nothing changes — they’re still all you
> 
> They’ll always be you…

Even if Felix had not been an expert at weaving a melody and lyrics together to convey what he was feeling, the desperate expression on his face and tears at the corners of his eyes as he sang through the final verse, made it all too clear what meant by it.

Dimitri’s pulse raced in his ears as Felix finished. He stared up up at Dimitri, his hands still gripping the mic. Dimitri was unaware of putting his guitar down or moving forward, but he soon had his arms around Felix and his lips against Felix’s—fitfully kissed back. Felix’s hands were in his hair and Dimitri was pulling him tightly into the embrace by his hips when they both remembered they were on stage.

Mostly, because Ingrid yelled, “We still have the rest of the set!” followed by Sylvain’s “Yeah, keep it in your pants!”

Then Dimitri heard the audience noises of much too enthusiastic approval and more than one catcall and went to retrieve his guitar, refusing to look in their direction.

Felix must have had a similar thought, because he sang the rest of their set directly to Dimitri, smiling.

♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫ ♫

Manuela Casagranda, one of the hosts and judges for the Battle of the Bands (at Gronder Field) made a show of wiggling her envelope before she opened it. Ignatz knew they’d been briefed who was the winner and the paper was for dramatic effect. “In fourth place, Hilda & the Schemers!”

Claude appeared to take that well with a shrug, while Hilda’s entire posture deflated. Their drummer, Leonie, patted her on the shoulder.

After a moment or two of arguing between Manuela and the other host/judge, Hanneman von Essar over who was going to announce the next rank, the Black Eagles were named for third place. Their immediate displeasure was clear on camera, but they all did well to put on smiles for the crowd.

That left the Ashen Wolves and the Blue Lions (an odd last minute decision in the narratively exciting but tragic circumstance of mass food poisoning) waiting on the final decision.

Constance appeared certain of their failure, sighing and having a worse posture than Hilda almost falling forward. Yuri and Hapi kept her standing, one of them on each arm. Balthus had thrown his shirt into the crowd during their performance and still stood shirtless, not seeming to pay much attention. Byleth… as Ignatz and Flayn’s repeated attempts at an interview proved, still seemed inscrutable.

Next to them, the Blue Lions—a childhood band now reunited—held hands tightly. Ingrid to Sylvain. Sylvain to Felix. And Felix to Dimitri.

“And the winner of the Battle of the Bands at Gronder Field is…” Manuela trilled off and then Hanneman took the mic and said, “The Ashen Wolves.”

Ignatz already knew the direction he and Flayn would go in, so he decided to keep the camera on the Blue Lions, knowing the feed from the Ashen Wolves would be easier to grab.

They only looked at each other and laughed.

♪

“So! What exactly does this mean for your future plans?” Flayn asked excitedly, nervous energy overflowing now that they were so close to wrapping up.

“I think we should rebrand,” Sylvain said, throwing an arm around Ingrid and winking at Flayn. “You know, use our limited runner-up fame to relaunch as the Faerghus Four!”

Ingrid said, “Nice try—” almost as simultaneously as, “Fuck no,” came from Felix, while Dimitri shook his head.

“Whatever,” Sylvain muttered. “Blue Lions is still good.”

Felix looked incredulously at him. “I’m not _quitting_ my band.”

“Me either,” Ingrid said, seemingly annoyed.

“What?” Sylvain balked at them and then threw his hands up in disgust. “We got the band back together? Dimitri, help me out here!”

Dimitri gestured to his throat and shrugged.

“I take it your reunion is not of a permanent sort?” Flayn asked, perking up in interest at another potential twist to what was already going to be a narratively fulfilling vlogumentary.

“Not for the band,” Felix scoffed. “That studio time we won for second place is for the Swamp Beasties. Why would I quit?”

“Because—” Sylvain gestured at himself and then between Dimitri and Felix, who unsurprisingly—after their minute long dramatic kiss-filled finish for their first song—were holding hands. “But!” He turned towards Ingrid. “So we’re still broken up?”

“The band, yes,” Ingrid said, patiently, while patting his face.

Sylvain groaned dejectedly, but then seemed to bolster himself. He stared in a direction in the distance. “Well… at least we beat Hilda.”

Ignatz pivoted the camera towards Hilda, close enough to overhear and glaring at him. “You’re such a dick, Gautier!”

Ignatz turned the camera again to catch Sylvain walking in her direction. “Why are you saying that like it’s an insult? Also, you guys need a new manager? I have some free time… a lot of free time. With me you could have a comeback from your tragic loss—ow, fuck Hilda, you know I’m kidding! Not about the manager thing though.”

Ignatz pivoted the camera back towards the Blue Lions, where Ingrid looked after Sylvain with a pinched expression.

“Are you all right?” Flayn asked.

Ingrid nodded, though her expression did not change. “I… just can’t believe I’m probably going to marry that.”

Ignatz moved the camera slightly to see Dimitri and Felix behind her, smothering their laughter in each other’s shoulders.

**Author's Note:**

> I am on twitter @waffle_fancy if you'd like to say hi! All comments/kudos are super appreciated!
> 
> I commissioned Felix's cursed jorts outfit [here](https://twitter.com/yaksinhats/status/1321843030501052418) and it is majestic.


End file.
